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THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


.  t/i'im,.   ii/<  /,„  I 


^  .''      '      r?  7^£  7oiv<f/C  OF  London: 

\~^r^___       fre.A'-Adcoclc- 


"  Stay  yet,  look  hack  with  me  unto  the  Tower. 
Pity,  you  ancient  stones,  those  tender  babes 
II  'horn  enzy  hath  iiniuured  'within  your  lualls, 
Rough  cradle  for  such  little  pretty  ones!  " 

Shakespeare's  "  Richard  III." 


Chapter  6. 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S 
LONDON 

BY 
A.  ST  JOHN  ADGOGK 


WITH  TWENTY   ILLUSTRATIONS  BY 

FREDERICK  ADGOCK 


NEW  YORK 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

1913 


Of) 


PREFACE 

GOING  up  Cornhill  a  year  or  two  ago,  on  a 
day  when  snow  was  falling,  I  happened  to 
remember  that  somewhere  about  there  was  the 
court  in  which  Scrooge,  of  Dickens's  Christmas  Carol, 
had  his  home  and  business  premises,  and  that  coming 
from  his  bleak  tank  of  an  office  one  cutting,  wintry 
night  Scrooge's  clerk,  Bob  Cratchit,  was  so  carried 
away  by  the  joyous  spirit  of  the  season  that  he  "  went 
down  a  shde  on  Cornhill,  at  the  end  of  a  lane  of  boys, 
twenty  times  in  honour  of  its  being  Christmas  Eve  ;  " 
and  somehow  Bob  Cratchit  became  as  real  to  me 
in  that  moment  as  were  any  of  the  obvious  people 
swarming  on  the  pavement  around  me.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  he  and  his  like  are  much  more  real  than  most 
of  us  ;  for  in  a  few  years  we  shall  have  passed  away 
like  shadows,  and  our  places  wiU  have  forgotten  us, 
but  he  will  stiU  be  going  down  that  sHde  on  Cornhill, 
as  he  has  been  going  down  it  already  for  exactly 
seventy  years.  If  any  so-caUed  real  person,  walking 
audibly  in  undeniable   boots,  dared   to   indulge  in  a 

V 

87V570 


vi  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

similar  pastime  upon  Comhill  nowadays,  he  would 
be  promptly  stopped  by  a  policeman,  and  probably 
locked  up  ;  but  Bob  Cratchit  is  so  potent  a  reality 
that  no  transitory  policeman  born  of  woman  has 
power  to  check  his  happy  outlawry  and  take  him  off 
that  slide. 

Surely  here  be  truths  sufficient  to  justify  the 
making  of  this  volume.  Why  should  we  differentiate 
between  people  who  were  once  clay  and  are  now 
dreams,  and  people  who  have  never  had  to  pass 
through  that  gross  period  of  probation  but  have 
been  dreams  from  the  beginning  ?  Many  books  have 
been  written  about  London's  associations  with  men 
and  women  of  the  more  solid  kind,  who  had  to  pay 
rent  for  their  houses  ;  I  have  written  two  myself  ; 
there  have  been  books  about  Dickens's  London  and 
Thackeray's  London,  but  T  do  not  think  there  has 
been  any  book  on  a  large  scale  devoted  to  London's 
associations  with  the  imaginary  folk  of  the  noveUsts 
and  dramatists — with  those  famihar  citizens  who 
are  literally  free  of  the  city  and  live  where  they  will 
in  it  unfretted  by  landlords  or  tax-collectors,  and 
who  having  once  walked  into  one  or  another  of  its 
streets  through  certain  books  are  walking  in  it 
always  for  whoever  actually  knows  London.  For 
you  know  very  httle  of  London  if  you  do  not  know 
more  than  you  can  see  of  it.  So  T  hope  to  be  forgiven 
for    making    this    humble    and    perhaps    inadequate 


PREFACE  vii 

contribution  to  a  branch  of  history  that  has   been 
rather  neglected, 

I  have  not  attempted  anything  in  the  way  of 
research.  As  a  fairly  miscellaneous  reader,  my  plan 
has  been  simply  to  select  a  route  and  to  go  along  it 
gossiping  of  what  memories  I  have  of  the  imaginary 
men  and  women  connected  with  the  places  we  pass 
by  the  way.  It  was  wrong  of  me  to  allow  divers 
sometime  real  people  haunting  the  same  ground  to 
intrude  upon  our  visionary  company,  but  I  have 
done  so  partly  for  the  sake  of  contrast,  and  partly 
because  I  am  equally  interested  in  them  and  could 
not  resist  the  temptation  to  let  them  come  in.  If  I 
have  gone  on  any  principle  at  all  it  has  been  one  of 
including  what  appeals  to  me  and  leaving  out  what 
does  not.  The  banks  that  stand  in  Lombard  Street 
are  so  many  dead  and  unattractive  piles  of  stone  so 
far  as  I  am  concerned,  but  if  I  knew  which  particular 
one  Thackeray  had  in  mind  when  he  sent  Becky 
Sharp  in  a  coach  to  Lombard  Street  to  cash  the  cheque 
Lord  Steyne  had  given  her  I  should  take  an  interest 
in  that  bank.  Even  before  I  was  aware  that  Shake- 
speare lodged  for  several  years  in  a  house  that  has 
been  replaced  by  a  tavern  at  the  corner  of  Silver 
Street  and  Monkwell  Street,  I  had  a  sort  of  sentimental 
regard  for  that  spot,  because  Ben  Jonson  in  his 
Staple  of  News  puts  Penny  boy,  Senr.,  to  hve  "  in 
Silver  Street,  the  region  of  money,  a  good  seat  for 


viii  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

an  usurer."  I  am  not  indifferent  to  the  fact  that 
Samuel  Titmarsh  was  a  clerk  in  an  Insurance  office 
in  Cornhill ;  that  Mr  Carker,  showing  all  his  teeth, 
used  to  ride  up  Cheapside  on  a  "  gleaming  bay  "  on 
his  road  home  of  evenings  from  Mr.  Dombey's  ware- 
house, which  lay  in  a  byway  towards  Leadenhall 
Street ;  that  Dobbin  and  Joe  Sedley  stayed  at 
Slaughter's  Coffee  House  in  St.  Martin's  Lane  ;  that 
Ferdinand  Armine,  of  Henrietta  Temple,  and  old 
Sedley,  with  little  George  Osborn,  of  Vanity  Fair, 
were  fond  of  roaming  in  Kensington  Gardens  ;  that 
Clem  Peckover  and  Bob  Hewett,  of  Gissing's  Nether 
World,  loitered  on  the  Embankment  and  leaned  over 
the  parapet  between  Waterloo  Bridge  and  Temple 
Pier  looking  at  the  river,  whilst  Clem  was  subtly 
tempting  Hewett  to  murder  her  husband,  so  that 
the  two  might  go  off  together  with  his  money — I 
am  not  indifferent  to  those  and  scores  of  other  such 
memories  though  I  have  said  nothing  about  them  in 
these  pages.  I  could  take  you  to  Tower  Hill  and 
show  you  where  Vincent  Scattergood,  of  Albert 
Smith's  Scattergood  Family,  gazed  about  him  and 
ruminated,  leaning  up  against  the  railings  of  Trinity 
Square  ;  and  the  last  time  I  crossed  Waterloo  Bridge 
and  noticed  the  shot  tower,  I  remembered  that,  in 
the  same  story,  Fogg,  the  dramatist,  who  lived  in  a 
blind  court  off  Drury  Lane,  used  to  cross  it  too, 
on  his   way   to   the   Surrey  Theatre,  in   Blackfriars 


PREFACE  ix 

Road,  and  invariably  "  became  preoccupied  with  en- 
deavouring to  render  the  shot  tower  available  "  in 
his  next  melodrama.  But  I  wondered  whether  many 
were  now  intimate  enough  with  Albert  Smith  and 
his  world  to  take  pleasure  in  such  records.  It  is  a 
long  time  since  I  read  him  myself,  and  I  confess  I 
shall  never  read  him  again  ;  therefore  you  will  find  I 
have  said  httle  about  him.  I  have  omitted  other 
associations  for  the  same  reason.  Indeed,  it  is 
probable  that  I  have  omitted  a  great  deal ;  some 
things  knowingly,  for  lack  of  space  ;  some  because  I 
forgot  them  until  too  late ;  and  some,  of  course,  from 
sheer  ignorance.  But  for  aU  my  sins  of  omission  I  offer 
no  excuse,  except  a  frank  acknowledgment  that,  even 
though  I  may  know  as  much  as  anyone  else,  I  do  not 
know  all  about  anything,  certainly  not  about  London, 
and  let  only  him  who  does  cast  the  first  stone  ! 

A.  ST.  J.  A. 


CONTENTS 


CHAP. 

I,  Personal  and  General 

II.  "  The  Saracen's  Head  "  and  Newgate  . 

III.  The  Poetry  of  Cheapside      .... 

IV.  Up  and  Down  the  City  Road 

V.  Mr.  PicKwacK,  Lizzie  Hexam,  and  some  Others 

VI.  To  the  Tower 

VII.  By  the  Thames,  and  up  the  Monument 
VIII.  South  of  the  Thames    . 
IX.  In  the  Shadow  of  St.  Paul's 
X.  Fleet  Street  and  the  Temple 
XL  The  Strand  and  Westminster 
XII.  Piccadilly  and  the  Parks 
XIII.  Oxford  Street,  Holborn  and  Clerkenwell 
Index     ....... 


PAGE 

I 

37 
51 
75 
98 

115 
160 

175 
203 
219 

245 
269 
282 
3^3 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


The  Tower  of  London    . 

Entrance    to    Bartholomew    Close,  West 
FIELD  .... 

Stepney  Green 

London  Stone,  Cannon  Street 

Paradise  Street,  Lambeth 

Walnut  Tree  Walk,  Lambeth 

High  Street,  Lambeth    . 

St.  Nicholas  Church,  Deptford 

Bankside  .... 

Holland  Street,  Blackfriars 

Clifford's  Inn 

Lincoln's  Inn  Gateway,  Chancery 

Lamb  Building,  Middle  Temple 

Fountain  Court,  Temple 

Walpole  House,  Chiswick  Mall 

The  Spaniards,  Hampstead 

The  Garden,  Staple  Inn 

53  Hatton  Garden 

Clerkenwell  Close 

Wash-house  Court,  Charterhouse 

xiii 


E,  West    ^ 

Frontispiece 

FACING   PAGE 

>mith- 

i6 

32 

48 

64 

80 

96 

112 

128 

144 

160 

Lane 

176 
192 

208 
224 
240 
256 
272 
288 
304 

THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


CHAPTER  I 

PERSONAL  AND   GENERAL 

EVERY  man  finds  his  own  charm  in  London, 
and  unfortunately  it  too  often  bHnds  him  to  all 
the  charms  that  other  men  have  found  in  it.  "I  see 
that  the  Londoner  is  also,  like  me,  a  stranger  in 
London,"  wrote  Emerson  in  one  of  his  Journals  ; 
"  I  have  a  good  deal  to  tell  him  of  it."  It  is  curious, 
how  complacently  the  visitor  or  new  resident  assumes 
that  the  mystery,  the  wonder,  the  beauty,  the  fasci- 
nation of  London  that  is  new  to  him  has  never  been 
discovered  before,  and  that  certainly  the  poor  Cockney 
takes  no  interest  in  his  native  city  and  knows  nothing 
about  it.  In  the  same  spirit  of  surprise  at  his  own 
discovery  a  writer  (evidently  one  of  these  excited 
new-comers)  noted  in  my  newspaper  the  other  morn- 
ing that  "the  average  Londoner  will  not  take  the 
trouble  to  find  out  that  on  a  very  clear  day  if  he 
looks  straight  down  Bouverie  Street  he  will  have  a 
view  of  the  Crystal  Palace  over  in  Surrey."  Well, 
I  am  a  Cockney  and  an  average  Londoner,  but  I 
shall  never  go  out  of  my  way  to  obtain  that  dis- 
tracting vision,  not  because  I  am  indifferent  to  the 
charm  of  London  but  simply  because  I  do  not  want 
to  see  the   Crystal   Palace,   and  do  not   count   any 

I 


2  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

prospect  of  it  among  the  thousand  and  one  reasons 
why  I  love  my  birthplace  and  keep  an  unfailing 
interest  in  it. 

You  may  be  irresistibly  attracted  to  London  by 
its  glamorous  literary  or  historical  associations  ;  by 
the  fulness,  variety,  and  eagerness  of  its  life  ;  by  the 
homely  sense  of  human  neighbourhood  that  enfolds 
you  in  its  crowded  thoroughfares  ;  by  the  bizarre 
splendour  and  pulsing  movement  of  it  when  all  the 
lamps  are  alight  and  the  shop-windows  flood  the 
tumultuous  streets  with  golden  fire  ;  by  the  mystery 
and  stranger  beauty  of  it  when  it  lies  lifeless  under 
the  quiet  stars  and  so  lonely  that  you  can  hear  the 
echo  of  your  footsteps  as  you  go  ;  by  the  countless 
real  and  imaginary  romances  of  men  and  women 
who  have  died  and  men  and  women  who  have  never 
lived  that  fill  its  highways  and  byways,  day  and 
night,  with  dreams  and  ghosts  ; — there  is  such  a  magic 
in  the  very  names  of  many  of  its  streets  that,  if  you 
know  it,  when  you  read  them  and  say  them  to  your- 
self the  long  rows  of  big  modern  buUdings  grow  as 
unsubstantial  as  a  mist  and  fade  away  and  rows 
of  smaller,  quainter,  more  picturesque  houses  rise 
in  their  stead  and  all  old  London  as  it  used  to  be 
but  will  never  be  again  closes  in  about  you  as  by 
enchantment. 

Perhaps  this  large  and  general  apprehension  of 
the  city's  witchery  is  coloured  and  intensified  by 
feelings  and  intimate  memories  peculiar  to  yourself, 
and  once  you  are  fully  susceptible  to  its  manifold, 
indescribable  charm,  that  view  of  the  Crystal  Palace 
on  a  clear  day  really  does  not  seem  a  joy  worth 
troubling   about.     It   may   be   well   enough   for   the 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  3 

casual  explorer  to  make  acquaintance  with  all  those 
"  places  of  interest  "  listed  in  the  guide-book  and 
then  go  away  and  boast  that  he  has  seen  more  of 
London  and  has  more  regard  for  it  than  the  average 
Londoner  who  confesses  he  has  never  been  up  the 
Monument  ;  but  the  Cockney,  as  a  rule,  looks 
upon/those  places  of  interest  as  convenient  objects 
intended  mainly  for  the  amusement  of  visitors — the 
things  that  he  loves  London  for  are  not  such  common 
public  property.  When  he  is  exiled  and  home-sick, 
far  off  in  Canada  or  Australia,  it  is  not  the  Duke  of 
York's  column,  or  even  Nelson's,  that  lifts  a  beckon- 
ing finger  in  his  dreams  to  lure  him  back  ;  it  is  no 
mental  picture  of  the  British  Museum  or  the  National 
GaUery  that  brings  the  longing  to  his  heart  or  the 
tears  to  his  eyes, — I  know  what  London  means  to 
him  because  I  know  what  it  means  to  me,  who  was 
born  in  it  and  have  grown  to  manhood  in  it,  so  that 
now  I  can  scarcely  walk  down  any  of  its  streets  but 
my  boyhood  or  my  younger  manhood  has  been  there 
before  me ;  something  of  my  past  has  been  trodden 
into  its  stones  and  is  as  inseparable  from  it,  though 
none  knows  anything  of  this  but  myself,  as  all  its 
older,  greater  memories. 

So  it  comes  to  pass  that  the  charm  of  London  is 
largely  incommunicable.  I  cannot  realise  all  that 
it  is  to  you,  nor  you  all  that  it  is  to  me,  because  our 
experiences,  our  personal  associations  with  it  are 
not  identical.  If  I  were  to  tell  you  why  a  certain 
doorway  in  Southampton  Street,  out  of  Holborn, 
is  the  saddest  place  in  all  London  to  me,  and  why 
it  is  I  can  never  think  of  St.  Swithin's  Lane  without 
seeing   it   paved   with   sunshine,   you   would   under- 


4  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

stand  my  feelings  but  could  not  share  them  ;  you 
could  still  pass  both  places  without  being  touched 
by  that  secret  spell  they  can  always  cast  upon  me. 
Therefore,  I  am  not  attempting  anything  so  hope- 
less as  to  distil  into  these  pages  the  whole  ineffable 
charm  of  London,  but  shall  be  satisfied  if  I  can  ex- 
tract from  that  some  one  of  its  many  enchantments 
to  which  we  are  all  amenable,  blending  with  it,  for 
purposes  of  comparison  and  sharper  emphasis,  just 
so  little  of  its  more  exclusively  personal  elements  as 
one  man  may  easily  communicate  to  another. 

It  does  not  matter  where  we  make  a  beginning  ; 
you  cannot  go  down  any  street  of  the  city  without 
walking  into  the  past ;  but  I  have  a  private  fancy 
to  start  from  Smithfield  Market,  partly  because  I 
am  drawn  to  it  by  curious  personal  ties,  chiefly 
because  it  looks  the  least  but  is  really  one  of  the 
most  romantic  parts  of  London.  Take  the  train  to 
Farringdon  Street,  and  as  you  come  out  of  the  station 
you  will  see  inscribed  on  the  wall  facing  you  "  Cow 
Cross  Street,  Leading  to  Turnmill  Street,"  and  the 
sight  of  that  name  may  remind  you  that  this  is  the 
street  that  was  in  old  days  known  colloquially  as 
Turnbull  Street  :  it  was  a  shockingly  disreputable 
place  of  brothels  and  gambling  dens,  as  you  have 
gathered  from  frequent  references  to  it  in  the  plays 
of  the  Elizabethan  dramatists.  "  Lord,  Lord !  " 
says  Falstaff,  talking  of  Justice  Shallow,  in  Henry 
the  Fourth,  "  how  subject  we  old  men  are  to  this 
vice  of  lying.  This  same  starved  Justice  hath  done 
nothing  but  prate  to  me  of  the  wildness  of  his 
youth  and  the  feats  he  hath  done  about  Turnbull 
Street ;  and  every  third  word  a  lie."     Ursula,  in  Ben 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  5 

Jonson's  Bartholomew  Fair,  cries  out  against  Knockem, 
the  horse-courser,  "  You  are  one  of  those  horse- 
leaches  that  gave  out  I  was  dead  in  Turnbull  Street 
of  a  surfeit  of  bottle-ale  and  tripes  ?  "  One  of  the 
characters  in  ]\Iiddleton's  A  Chaste  Maid  in  Cheap- 
side  exclaims,  on  stealing  a  basket  of  provisions  and 
finding  nothing  but  veal  in  it, 

I  promised  faithfully 
To  send  this  morning  a  fat  quarter  of  lamb 
To  a  kind  gentlewoman  in  Turnbull  Street. 

Justice  Nimis,  counting  up  his  estate  in  Randolph's 
The  Muses'  Looking-Glass ,  says, 

The  yearly  value 
Of  my  fair  manor  of  Clerkenwell  is  pounds 
So  many,  besides  new-year's  capons,  the  lordship 
Of  Turnbull,  so — which,  with  my  Pict-hatch  grange 
And  Shoreditch  farm,  and  other  premises 
Adjoining — very  good,  a  pretty  maintenance 
To  keep  the  Justice  of  Peace,  and  coram  too. 

Pict-hatch  was  an  infamous  establishment  in  Turn- 
bull  Street,  and  you  have  Falstaff  again,  in  The 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  rating  Pistol,  with  "  Go  : 
a  short  knife  and  a  throng  ! — to  your  manor  of  Pict- 
hatch  !  go  "  ;  and  Randolph  starts  the  young  gallant, 
Neanias,  singing,  in  Hey  for  Honesty,  Down  with 
Knavery, 

Come,  beldame,  follow  mc, 
And  in  my  footsteps  tread, 
Then  set  up  shop  in  Turnbull  Street  .  .  , 

Well,  if  you  walk  a  few  yards  to  the  left  as  you 
come  out  of  the  railway  station,  here  you  are  in  that 


6  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

same  Tummill,  otherwise  Turnbull  Street ;  but  there 
is  no  sign  of  a  brook  here  now,  nor  any  of  the  mills 
that  Stow  says  used  to  stand  hereabouts,  nor  any 
of  those  rascally  haunts  with  which  the  playwrights 
of  Shakespeare's  time  were  so  familiar.  One  side 
of  the  street  is  occupied  by  a  blank  wall  that  shuts 
off  the  underground  railway,  and  the  other  by  tower- 
ing warehouses  and  severely  decorous  business  pre- 
mises. There  is  a  narrow  byway  out  of  it,  with 
a  brood  of  furtive,  squalid  alleys  and  quaint  frowsy 
courts,  in  which  Falstaff  might  still  feel  compara- 
tively at  home,  but  we  are  for  Smithfield,  and  will  turn 
back  and  along  Cow  Cross  Street  to  get  there.  But 
I  cannot  pass  by  Peter  Lane,  which  was  formerly 
Peter  Street,  in  Cow  Cross  Street,  without  remember- 
ing that  unhappy  urchin,  young  St.  Giles,  in  Douglas 
Jerrold's  almost  forgotten  novel  of  St.  Giles  and  St. 
James  :  he  had  been  led  by  the  cunning  Tom  Blast 
into  stealing  a  horse,  which  he  rode  into  Smithfield. 

"  He  then  walked  the  pony  slowly  up  Long  Lane,  and  soon 
as  he  espied  the  Blue  Posts,  faithful  to  his  orders^  he  dismounted, 
looking  anxiously  about  him  for  his  friend  and  instructor, 
Tom  Blast.  A  quarter  of  an  hour  passed,  and  still  he  came 
not.  And  then,  and  for  the  first  time,  he  looked  at  the  stolen 
goods  with  lowering  eyes,  and  his  heart  felt  leaden.  .  .  .  Any- 
thing to  be  well  clear  of  the  pony.  With  this  thought  St.  Giles 
had  his  foot  in  the  stirrup,  when  he  was  tapped  upon  the 
shoulder  by  a  man  plainly  and  comfortably  dressed  in  a  dark- 
grey  suit,  wearing  a  light  flaxen  wig  in  tight  curls,  surmounted 
by  a  large  beaver  hat,  scrupulously  sleek.  He  had  a  broad 
fat  face,  with  a  continual  smile  laid  like  lacquer  upon  it.  And 
when  he  spoke,  he  spoke  very  gently  and  very  softly,  as  with 
lips  of  butter. 

"  '  My  dear  little  boy,'  said  the  stranger,  patting  St.  Giles 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  7 

affectionately  on  the  back,  '  where  have  you  been  so 
long  ?  ' 

"  St.  Giles  looked— he  could  not  help  it — very  suspiciously 
at  the  stranger  ;  then  scratching  his  head,  he  observed,  '  Don't 
know  you,  sir.' 

"  '  I  dare  say  not ;  how  should  you,  my  dear  ?  But  you 
will  know  me,  and  for  a  friend.  I've  waited  for  you  these  ten 
minutes.'  " 

This  kindly  stranger  gently  twitched  the  bridle  from 
his  hand,  and  St.  Giles  felt  that  the  stolen  pony  was 
being  stolen  from  him  ;  but  his  suspicions  were  quieted  ; 
he  was  rewarded  with  a  guinea,  and  roamed  about 
London  and  lived  on  this  for  over  a  week. 

"  It  was  on  the  ninth  day  of  St.  Giles's  absence  from  his 
maternal  home,  and  the  pilgrim  of  London  stood  before  a 
house  of  humble  entertainment  in  Cow  Cross.  The  time  was 
noon  ;  and  St.  Giles,  feeling  the  last  threepence  in  his  pocket — 
turning  them  over  one  by  one — was  endeavouring  to  arbitrate 
between  pudding  and  a  bed.  If  he  bought  a  cut  of  pudding — 
and  through  the  very  window-pane  he  seemed  to  nose  its 
odour — he  had  not  wherewithal  to  buy  a  lodging.  What  of 
that .''  London  had  many  doorways — hospitable  stone-steps — 
for  nothing  ;  and  pudding  must  be  paid  for.  Still  he  hesitated  ; 
when  the  cook-shop  man  removed  the  pudding  from  the  window. 
This  removal  decided  St.  Giles.  He  rushed  into  the  shop, 
and  laid  down  his  last  worldly  stake  upon  the  counter.  '  Three- 
pennorth  o'  puddin',  and  a  good  threepennorth,'  said  St.  Giles. 
With  a  look  of  half-reproof  and  half-contempt  the  tradesman 
silently  executed  the  order ;  and  in  a  few  moments  St.  Giles 
stood  upon  the  King's  highway,  devouring  with  great  relish 
his  last  threepence.  Whilst  thus  genially  employed,  he  heard 
a  far-off  voice  roar  through  the  muggy  air  :  his  heart  beat, 
and  he  ate  almost  to  choking  as  he  listened  to  these  familiar 
words  : — '  A  Most  True  and  Particular  Account  of  the  Horrible 
Circumstance  of  a  Bear  that  has  been  Fed  upon  Five  Young 


8  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Children  in  a  Cellar  in  Westminster  ! '  It  was  the  voice  of 
Blast ;  and  St.  Giles  swallowed  his  pudding,  hurriedly  used 
the  back  of  his  hand  for  a  napkin^  and  following  the  sound  of 
the  crier^  was  in  a  trice  in  Peter  Street^  and  one  of  the  mob 
that  circled  the  marvel-monger  of  Hog  Lane." 

Half  of  Cow  Cross  Street  still  remains  very  much 
what  it  was  when  St.  Giles  knew  it  ;  there  is  still  an 
old  cook-shop  there  that  might  well  be  the  very  one 
he  patronised,  and  two  doors  beyond  it  is  Peter 
Street,  We  emerge  from  Cow  Cross  Street,  and 
across  the  road,  all  along  the  other  side  of  Charter- 
house Street,  stretches  the  heavy,  red  length  of 
Smithfield  Market ;  the  yawning  central  arcade  takes 
you  at  a  gulp,  and  mid-way  through  we  glance  in 
at  the  great  gateways  to  right  and  left  of  us  and  see 
white-robed  butchers  moving  about  in  cool,  far- 
reaching  groves  of  gross  mutton  and  beef  ;  trucks 
loaded  with  meat  pass  and  repass  us  ;  and  outside, 
all  round  the  building,  butchers'  carts  and  vans 
cluster  closely,  like  flies  on  a  bone.  Coming  out  at 
the  other  end  of  the  arcade,  before  us  is  the  broad 
open  space  of  West  Smithfield,  and  immediately  on 
our  left  is  that  Long  Lane  into  which  St.  Giles  rode 
on  his  stolen  horse.  In  the  centre  of  the  open  space 
a  road  winds  down  to  a  Goods  Station  of  the  Midland 
Railway  that  is  out  of  sight  under  the  ground  upon 
which  the  martyrs  used  to  be  burned  at  the  stake ; 
beyond,  the  dull  stone  buildings  of  St.  Bartholo- 
mew's Hospital  gloom  all  along  the  opposite  side  of 
the  square  and  extend  into  Giltspur  Street,  and  if 
you  say  that  name  to  yourself  properly  the  sordid, 
red  Market  loses  its  solidity  and  rolls  away  like  a 
cloud  ;    the  huge  Hospital  dwindles  to  less  than  a 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  9 

quarter  its  present  size  ;  the  fountain  and  railed-in 
garden  go  from  the  middle  of  the  square,  and  the 
subterranean  Goods  Station  with  them ;  the  big 
new  banks  and  taverns  and  warehouses  shrink  and 
vanish  and  their  places  are  filled  by  a  picturesque 
huddle  of  quaint  old  red-tiled  houses  and  inns  from 
the  windows  of  which  crowds  of  laughing  ladies  and 
gallant  gentlemen  look  out  upon  a  broad  green  field 
from  which  noisy  swarms  of  the  common  city  folk 
are  shut  off  by  stout  wooden  barriers  ;  and  pre- 
sently up  this  same  Giltspur  Street  a  company  of 
knights,  flashing  the  sun  back  from  their  armour,  ride 
in  to  a  tournament.  The  one  familiar  object  of  modem 
London  that  rose  before  them  familiarly  as  they  rode 
in  is  the  glorious  old  church  of  St.  Bartholomew,  that 
stands  at  the  eastern  corner  of  Smithfield. 

But  you  may  read  all  about  this  in  Stow's  Survey 
of  London.  The  church  has  undergone  numerous 
restorations  but  much  of  it  remains  as  when  it  was 
first  built  in  1102  by  Rahere,  King  Henry  the  First's 
jester,  who  turned  monk  and  became  its  first  Prior. 
Stow  tells  you,  too,  of  the  tournaments,  "  For  example 
to  note  : — In  the  year  1357,  the  31st.  of  Edward  IIL, 
great  and  royal  jousts  were  there  holden  in  Smith- 
field  ;  there  being  present  the  Kings  of  England, 
France  and  Scotland,  with  many  other  nobles  and 
great  estates  of  divers  lands,"  and  after  several  such 
records  he  comes  to,  "  In  the  14th.  of  Richard  II., 
after  Froisart,  royal  jousts  and  tournaments  were 
proclaimed  to  be  done  in  Smithfield,  to  begin  on 
Sunday  next  after  the  feast  of  St.  Michael.  ...  At 
the  day  appointed  there  issued  forth  of  the  Tower, 
about   the   third   hour   of   the   day,   sixty   coursers, 


10  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

apparelled  for  the  jousts,  and  upon  every  one  an 
esquire  of  honour,  riding  a  soft  pace  ;  then  came 
forth  sixty  ladies  of  honour,  mounted  upon  palfreys, 
riding  on  the  one  side,  richly  apparelled,  and  every 
lady  led  a  knight  with  a  chain  of  gold,  those  knights 
being  on  the  king's  party  had  their  harness  and 
apparel  garnished  with  white  harts,  and  crowns  of 
gold  about  the  harts'  necks,  and  so  they  came  riding 
through  the  streets  of  London  to  Smithfield,  with 
a  great  number  of  trumpets  and  other  instruments 
of  music  before  them.  The  king  and  queen,  who 
were  lodged  in  the  bishop's  palace  of  London,  were 
come  from  thence,  with  many  great  estates,  and 
placed  in  chambers  to  see  the  jousts  ;  the  ladies 
that  led  the  knights  were  taken  down  from  their 
palfreys,  and  went  up  to  chambers  prepared  for  them. 
Then  alighted  the  esquires  of  honour  from  their 
coursers,  and  the  knights  in  good  order  mounted 
upon  them  ;  and  after  their  helmets  were  set  on 
their  heads,  and  being  ready  in  all  points,  proclama- 
tion made  by  the  heralds,  the  jousts  began,  and 
many  commendable  courses  were  run,  to  the  great 
pleasure  of  the  beholders.  These  jousts  continued 
many  days,  with  great  feasting,  as  ye  may  read  in 
Froisart."  And  Will  Catur,  the  armourer,  was  not 
the  only  man  accused  of  treason  who  brought  his 
innocence  to  the  trial  by  combat  and  fought 
his  accuser  and  slew  him  or  was  slain  by  him  in 
Smithfield. 

Already,  in  those  years,  a  horse  and  cattle  market 
was  held  in  Smithfield  every  Friday,  and  already 
the  annual  Fair  of  Bartholomew  had  beeen  started : 
part  of  it,  devoted  entirely  to  the  sale  of  goods,  was 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  11 

held  in  the  churchyard  and  in  the  Close  surrounding 
the  church,  and  part  of  it,  given  over  to  amusements, 
shows,  feastings  and  general  frivolity  was  scattered 
all  about  the  open  plain  of  Smithfield  itself.  The 
Fairs  outlasted  the  Tournaments,  and  when  the 
tournament  had  become  a  barbarous  thing  of  the 
past,  the  London  mob  made  holiday  in  Smithfield 
to  see  the  stake  driven  into  the  earth  here,  the 
faggots  piled,  smoke  rise  and  many  a  stubborn 
martyr  burnt  alive  in  the  great  name  of  Christianity. 
Scores  of  such  victims  to  the  childish  dogmas  of 
conceited  theologians  went  up  to  heaven  in  their 
chariots  of  fire  from  this  same  ground,  but  more 
readily  than  any  other  I  recall  the  martyrdom  of 
Anne  Askew,  less  on  account  of  poor  Anne  herself, 
perhaps,  than  because  of  a  certain  detailed  and 
amazingly  vivid  picture  that  is  part  of  Foxe's  nar- 
rative of  her  sufferings.  Her  chief  offence  was  that 
she  differed  with  the  Bishop  of  London  and  his 
priests  concerning  the  doctrine  of  transubstantia- 
tion  :  she  refused  to  agree  that  the  sacramental 
bread  was  the  veritable  body  of  Christ.  "  As  for 
what  ye  call  your  god,"  she  said  boldly,  according 
to  Foxe,  "  it  is  a  piece  of  bread  ;  for  a  more  proof 
thereof,  mark  it  when  you  list,  let  it  but  lie  in  the 
box  three  months  and  it  will  be  mouldy  and  so  turn 
to  nothing  that  is  good.  Whereupon  I  am  per- 
suaded that  it  cannot  be  God."  They  imprisoned 
her  in  the  Tower  and  piously  endeavoured  to  change 
her  mind  by  stretching  her  limbs  on  the  rack,  till 
she  was  so  maimed  and  warped  that  she  could  not 
use  her  feet  ;  then,  as  she  still  failed  to  sec  eye  to 
eye  with   them,   they  decided  that   there  was  only 


12  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

one  way  left  in  which  they  could  get  the  best  of  the 
argument,  so,  as  Foxe  has  it  : 

"  The  day  of  her  execution  being  appointed^  she  was  brought 
into  Smithfield  in  a  chair,  because  she  could  not  go  on  her 
feet,  by  means  of  her  great  torments.  When  she  was  brought 
to  the  stake,  she  was  tied  by  the  middle  with  a  chain  that 
held  up  her  body.  When  all  things  were  thus  prepared  to 
the  fire,  Dr.  Shaxton,  who  was  then  appointed  to  preach, 
began  his  sermon.  Anne  Askew,  hearing  and  answering  again 
unto  him,  where  he  said  well,  confirmed  the  same  ;  where  he 
said  amiss,  there,  said  she,  he  misseth  and  speaketh  without 
the  book. 

"  The  sermon  being  finished,  the  other  martyrs  (John  Lacels, 
John  Adams,  and  Nicholas  Belenian),  standing  there  tied  to 
three  several  stakes,  ready  to  their  martyrdom,  began  their 
prayers.  The  multitude  and  concourse  of  the  people  were 
exceeding,  the  place  where  they  stood  being  railed  about  to 
keep  out  the  press.  Upon  the  bench,  under  St.  Bartholomew's 
church,  sat  Wrisley,  chancellor  of  England,  the  old  Duke  of 
Norfolk,  the  Lord  Mayor,  with  divers  other  more.  Before 
the  fire  should  be  set  unto  them,  one  of  the  bench  hearing 
that  they  had  gunpowder  about  them  and  being  afraid  the 
faggots  by  the  strength  of  the  gunpowder  would  come  flying 
about  their  ears,  began  to  be  afraid  :  but  the  Earl  of  Bedford, 
declaring  unto  him  the  gunpowder  was  not  laid  under  the 
faggots,  but  only  about  their  bodies  to  rid  them  out  of  their 
pain,  which  having  vent,  there  was  no  danger  to  them  of  the 
faggots,  so  diminished  their  fear. 

"  Then  WVisley,  Lord  Chancellor,  sent  to  Anne  Askew 
letters,  offering  to  her  the  King's  pardon  if  she  would  recant. 
Who  refusing  once  to  look  upon  them,  made  this  answer  again  : 
That  she  came  not  thither  to  deny  her  Lord  and  Master.  Then 
were  the  letters  likewise  offered  unto  the  other,  who  in  like 
manner,  following  the  constancy  of  the  woman,  denied  not  only 
to  receive  them,  but  also  to  look  on  them.  Whereupon  the 
Lord  Mayor  commanding  fire  to  be  put  to  them,  cried  with 
a  loud  voice,  Fiat  justitia. 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  13 

"  And  thus  the  good  Anne  Askew,  with  these  blessed  martyrs, 
being  troubled  so  many  manner  of  ways,  and  ha\ang  passed 
through  so  many  torments,  having  now  ended  the  long  course 
of  her  agonies,  being  compassed  in  with  flames  of  fire,  as  a 
blessed  sacrifice  unto  God,  she  slept  in  the  Lord,  anno  1546, 
leaving  behind  her  a  singular  example  for  all  men  to  follow." 

These  things  do  not  pass  away  ;  and  I  can  never 
cross  Smithfield  nowadays  without  hearing  that 
loud  cry  of  the  Lord  Mayor's  thrilling  above  the 
dense  mob  again,  without  seeing  the  flames  rise 
about  the  chained  figures  of  the  four  martyrs,  with- 
out seeing  on  the  bench  in  front  of  this  same  old  St. 
Bartholomew's  church  that  little  group  of  elderly, 
gorgeously  attired  dignitaries,  discussing  the  prob- 
able action  of  the  gunpowder  mercifully  fastened 
round  the  waists  of  the  sufferers  and  fussily  agitated 
by  fears  for  their  own  safety.  So  long  as  Smithfield 
remains  they  keep  their  place  in  it  for  those  who 
know  where  to  look  for  them  and  how  to  see  them. 

But  Smithfield  is  haunted  by  other  and  happier 
memories.  For  certain  August  days  of  every  year, 
during  several  centuries  and  down  to  less  than  a 
century  ago,  it  was  all  aroar  with  the  business  and 
revelry  of  Bartholomew  Fair.  Sometimes  the  Fair 
would  begin  only  a  day  after  one  of  the  martyrdoms, 
and  the  roistering  London  crowd  would  swarm  in 
to  make  merry  and  riot  among  the  stalls  and  booths 
over  earth  that  was  still  blackened  from  yesterday's 
fires.  Look  round  and  you  shall  note  ancient  land- 
marks of  those  days  in  the  old  church,  the  hospital, 
and  in  the  names  of  the  streets  :  in  Long  Lane, 
Cloth  Fair,  Bartholomew  Close,  Little  Britain  (though 
this  end  of  it  was  Duck  Lane  in  the  Fair  time),  Gilt- 


14  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

spur  Street,  Hosier  Lane  and  Cock  Lane,  the  comer 
of  which  is  the  veritable  Pie  Corner  which  was  once 
occupied  by  a  famous  eating-house  of  that  name 
and  surrounded  by  cooks'  stalls  and  refreshment 
tents  whilst  the  Fair  was  on.  The  Great  Fire  of 
London,  which  began  at  Pudding  Lane,  in  East- 
cheap,  ended  by  burning  down  the  ancient  hostelry 
at  Pie  Corner,  and  a  tavern  called  "  The  Fortune 
of  War,"  which  stood  on  the  site  until  about  a  year 
ago,  exhibited  the  gUded  figure  of  an  obese  boy 
above  its  doorway,  with  an  inscription  to  the  effect 
that  it  was  erected  in  memory  of  "  the  late  Fire  of 
London,  occasioned  by  the  sin  of  gluttony,  1666." 
I  am  glad  that  the  new  building  now  reared  on 
the  spot  preserves  this  historic  boy  in  a  niche  at  his 
famUiar  comer.  There  used  to  be  many  inns  here- 
abouts that  were  closely  associated  with  the  Fair, 
but  all  these  are  demolished  or  have  been  rebuilt  and 
changed  their  names,  except  The  Crown,  two  doors 
from  Hosier  Lane,  where,  according  to  Stow,  writ- 
ing in  1589,  "  the  hosiers  of  old  time  "  carried  on 
their  businesses. 

There  exist  in  the  Guildhall  or  British  Museums 
quaint  seventeenth-century  advertisements  and  hand- 
bills from  which  you  may  gather  something  of  the 
wonders  exhibited  at  the  Fair,  such  as  : 

"  Just  arrived  from  abroad  and  are  to  be  seen  or  sold  at 
the  first  house  on  the  pavement  from  the  end  of  Hosier  Lane, 
during  Bartholomew  Fair — A  large  and  beautiful  young  Camel 
from  Grand  Cairo,  in  Egypt.  This  Creature  is  twenty-three 
years  old  ;  his  head  and  neck  are  like  those  of  a  deer  ;  "  and 

"At  Mr  Croome's,  at  the  sign  of  the  Shoe  and  Slap,  near 
the  Hospital  Gate  in  West  Smithfield,  is  to  be  seen  The  Wonder 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  15 

OF  Nature,  a  Girl  above  sixteen  years  of  age^  born  in  Cheshire, 
and  not  above  eighteen  inches  long,  having  shed  the  teeth 
seven  several  times,  and  not  a  perfect  bone  in  any  part  of  her, 
only  the  Head,  yet  she  hath  all  her  senses  to  Admiration,  and 
Discourses.  Reads  very  well,  sings,  whistles,  and  all  very 
pleasant  to  hear  ;  "  and 

"  At  the  corner  of  Hosier  Lane,  and  near  Mr. 
Parker's  booth,  there  is  to  be  seen  a  Prodigious 
Monster  lately  brought  over  by  Sir  Thomas  Grantham 
from  the  great  Mogul's  country,  being  a  Man  with 
one  Head  and  two  distinct  Bodies,  both  Mascu- 
line ;  there  is  also  with  him  his  Brother,  who  is  a 
priest  of  the  Mahometan  Religion.  Price  Sixpence 
and  One  Shilling  the  best  Places  ;  "  and  there  are 
announcements  of  an  Indian  King  to  be  seen  at  the 
Golden  Lyon,  near  the  Hospital  Gate  ;  of  a  Little 
Fairy  Woman  "  at  the  Hart's  Horn  in  Pye  Corner  "  ; 
of  a  Giant  Man  on  show  "  between  Hosier  Lane  and 
the  Swan  Tavern,  at  the  Saddler's  shop  "  ;  of  "  most 
excellent  and  incomparable  performances  in  Danc- 
ing on  the  Slack  Rope  "  at  "  Mr.  Barnes's  and  Mr. 
Appleby's  Booth,  between  the  Crown  Tavern  and 
the  Hospital  Gate  ;  "  and  among  the  many  faded 
bills  of  the  plays  acted  in  the  Fair  is  one  announc- 
ing performances  of  "an  excellent  new  Droll  called 
'  The  Tempest,  or  the  Distressed  Lovers,'  "  at 
Miller's  Booth  over  against  the  Cross  Daggers,  near 
the  Crown  Tavern.  The  ground  was  thickly  strewn 
with  such  Freak  Shows  and  Theatrical  Booths,  and 
there  are  ample  records  of  these,  and  of  the  show- 
men and  the  actors  ;  Pcpys  tells  you  of  how  he  and 
his  friends  would  go  there  ;  and  one  likes  to  think 
of    Ben    Jonson   loitering    about    Smithficld    among 


16  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  sights  and  sounds  of  the  Fair  and  one  day  sitting 
down  to  write  that  play  of  Bartholomew  Fair  in 
which,  for  the  first  time  and  for  ever,  some  of  the 
multitude  that  struggled  and  elbowed  each  other 
there  and  fought  for  places  in  the  booths  and  round 
the  refreshment  stalls  of  Pie  Comer  were  individual- 
ised and  made  as  actual  for  us  as  any  of  the  real 
men  and  women  who  belong  to  the  history  of  the 
place. 

Jonson  had  no  sympathy  with  Puritanism,  and 
he  makes  occasion  in  his  comedy  for  some  incidental 
satire  of  the  worst  features  of  that  sect,  then  in  its 
infancy,  but  in  a  generation  or  so  to  rise  full-grown 
and  become  the  ruling  spirit  of  the  nation.  His 
first  scene  opens  in  the  house  of  John  Littlewit,  a 
lawyer.  Littlewit  has  had  a  hand  in  writing  a  play 
which  is  to  be  performed  in  one  of  the  booths  at 
Bartholomew  Fair,  and  he  is  anxious  to  go  and  see 
it  and  to  take  his  wife,  Win-the-Fight  Littlewit, 
with  him.  But  she  is  much  under  the  influence  of 
her  Puritanical  mother,  the  widow  Purecraft,  who 
lives  with  them,  and  both  women  are  largely 
dominated  by  the  hypocritical  Puritan  preacher, 
Zeal-of-the-Land  Busy,  who  has  secret  designs  of 
marrying  the  widow  for  her  money  : 

"  Win,  you  see,  'tis  the  fashion  to  go  to  the  Fair, 
Win,"  argues  Littlewit  ;  "we  must  to  the  Fair, 
too,  you  and  I,  Win.  I  have  an  affair  in  the  Fair, 
Win,  a  puppet-play  of  mine  own  making,  say  no- 
thing, that  I  writ  for  the  motion-man,  which  you 
must  see.  Win."  "  I  would  I  might,  John,"  answers 
Mrs.  Littlewit ;  "  but  my  mother  will  never  consent 
to  such  a  profane  motion,  she  will  call  it."     "  Tut, 


pm\\ 


y^!5     i 


!      K 


^r 


ENTfiANce  TO 
t>AR.THOLOI^£W  ClOSd 

'  TIf:  oU,  oU  house  thai  r/srs,  looking  as  if  it  veri-  Imilt  oj  the  Tiiy  stujUf  o/  i/rcams. 


:f  tital  risi-s,  looking  as  ij  it  vere  Imilt  o/  the 
n/iozv  thi-  gatcTvay  oJ  Bartholoiiuiu  Church. 


Chapter  I 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  17 

we'll  have  a  device,  a  dainty  one,"  he  protests.  .  .  . 
"  I  have  it.  Win,  I  have  it,  i'  faith,  and  'tis  a  fine 
one.  Win,  long  to  eat  of  a  pig,  sweet  Win,  in  the 
Fair,  do  you  see,  in  the  heart  of  the  Fair,  not  at 
Pye-corner.  Your  mother  will  do  anything,  Win, 
to  satisfy  your  longing,  you  know." 

And  this  device  is  successful.  Before  consenting, 
Mrs.  Purecraft  consults  her  adviser,  Zeal-of-the- 
Land  Busy,  a  forerunner  of  Mr.  Chadband,  and  he, 
having  private  hankerings  after  the  flesh-pots,  is 
won  over  not  only  to  seeing  how  a  visit  to  the  Fair 
may  be  allowable  but  into  accompanying  the  party 
for  their  better  guidance.     He  expounds  : 

"  Now  pig,  it  is  a  meat,  and  a  meat  that  is  nourishing  and 
may  be  longed  for,  and  so  consequently  eaten  ;  it  may  be  eaten  ; 
very  exceeding  well  eaten  ;  but  in  the  Fair,  and  as  a  Bartholo- 
mew pig,  it  cannot  be  eaten  ;  for  the  very  calling  it  a  Bartholo- 
mew pig,  and  to  eat  it  so,  is  a  spice  of  idolatry,  and  you  may 
make  the  Fair  no  better  than  one  of  the  high-places.  This,  I 
take  it,  is  the  state  of  the  question  :  a  high-place.  .  .  .  Surely 
it  may  be  otherwise,  but  it  is  subject  to  construction,  subject, 
and  hath  a  face  of  offence  with  the  weak,  a  great  face,  a  foul 
face  ;  but  that  face  may  have  a  veil  put  over  it  and  be  shadowed 
as  it  were  ;  it  may  be  eaten,  and  in  the  Fair,  I  take  it,  in  a 
booth,  in  the  tents  of  the  wicked  ;  the  place  is  not  much,  not 
very  much,  we  may  be  religious  in  the  midst  of  the  profane, 
so  it  be  eaten  with  a  reformed  mouth,  with  sobriety  and 
humbleness ;  not  gorged  in  with  gluttony  and  greediness, 
there's  the  fear  ;  for,  should  she  go  there  as  taking  pride  in 
the  place,  or  delight  in  the  unclean  dressing,  to  feed  the  vanity 
of  the  eye,  or  lust  of  the  palate,  it  were  not  well,  it  were  not  fit, 
it  were  abominable,  and  not  good.  ...  In  the  way  of  comfort 
to  the  weak,  I  will  go  and  eat.  I  will  eat  exceedingly,  and 
prophesy  ;  there  may  be  good  use  made  of  it  too,  now  I  think 
on't ;    by  the  public  eating  of  swine's  flesh,  to  profess  our 


18  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

hating  and  loathing  of  Judaism,  whereof  the  brethren  stand 
taxed.    I  will  therefore  eat,  yea,  I  will  eat  exceedingly." 

Thereafter,  through  all  the  scenes  of  the  next  four 
acts,  you  find  Littlewit,  his  wife,  his  mother-in-law 
and  the  Puritan  preacher  roaming  about  Smithfield, 
playing  their  parts  in  a  good  story  that  develops 
amidst  the  hubbub  and  jollity  of  the  Fair.  Apart 
from  two  or  three  of  the  gentry  and  their  servants 
intimately  concerned  in  the  story,  the  characters 
are  the  puppet-show  men,  a  dupe  who  keeps  one 
of  the  clothier's  stalls  in  Bartholomew  Close,  toy- 
sellers,  a  wrestler,  a  pickpocket,  a  beadle,  watchmen, 
cooks,  eating-house  keepers,  a  man  connected  with 
the  horse  fair,  a  ballad  singer  and  members  of  the 
general  rabble.  You  have  a  glimpse  of  the  per- 
formance in  one  of  the  puppet-shows,  you  see  some- 
thing of  the  rascalities,  the  trickeries,  the  feasting, 
the  buying  and  selling,  the  uproarious  merriment, 
the  broad  humours  and  all  the  fun  of  the  Fair,  and 
from  time  to  time  the  air  fills  with  the  multifarious 
cries  and  the  noise  of  it.  A  number  of  people  come 
straggling  past  and  Leatherhead,  the  toyman,  breaks 
out  at  once  : 

"  Leatherhead.  What  do  you  lack  ?  What  is't  you  buy  ? 
What  do  you  lack  ?  Rattles,  drums,  halberts,  horses,  babies 
o'  the  best,  fiddles  of  the  finest  ? 

Enter  Costardmonger,  followed  by  Nightingale  (the 
ballad-monger). 

Costard.  Buy  any  pears,  pears,  very  fine  pears  ! 
Joan  Trash.  Buy  any  gingerbread,  gilt  ginger-bread  ! 
Nightingale.  Hey  !    (Sings) 

Now  the  Fair's  a-fiUing  ! 
.,  ,  0,  for  a  tune  to  startle 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  19 

The  birds  o'  the  booths  here^billing 
Yearly  with  old  saint  Bartle  ! 
The  drunkards  they  are  wading, 
The  punks  and  chapmen  trading  ; 
Who'd  see  the  fair  without  his  lading  ? 

Buy  any  ballads^  new  ballads  ?  " 

But  all  these  and  thousands  of  other  such  voices 
have  passed  into  the  silence,  and  in  1855,  after  over 
seven  hundred  years  of  lusty  life,  Bartholomew 
Fair  came  to  an  end.  Wordsworth  saw  something 
of  it  m  its  latter  years,  and  you  may  picture  him, 
a  curiously  alien  figure,  straying  about  in  its  pande- 
monium, to  go  home  and  by  and  by,  amid  the  quiet 
of  his  Westmorland  hills,  put  his  recollections  of  it 
into  The  Prelude,  when  he  comes  to  discourse  on  his 
residence  in  London  : 

What  anarchy  and  din 
Barbarian  and  informal,  a  phantasma 
Monstrous  in  colour,  motion,  shape,  sight,  sound  ! 
Below,  the  open  space,  through  every  nook 
Of  the  wide  area,  twinkles,  is  alive 
With  heads  ;  the  midway  region,  and  above, 
Is  thronged  with  staring  pictures  and  huge  scrolls, 
Dumb  proclamations  of  the  Prodigies  ; 
With  chattering  monkeys  dangling  from  their  poles. 
And  children  whirling  in  their  roundabouts.  .  .  . 
The  Stone-eater,  the  man  that  swallows  fire, 
Giants,  ventriloquists,  the  Invisible  Girl, 
The  Bust  that  speaks  and  moves  its  goggling  eyes. 
The  Waxwork,  Clockwork,  all  the  marvellous  craft 
Of  modern  Merlins,  Wild  Beasts,  Puppet  Shows.  .  .  . 

Strange,    to    pace     the    drab,    busy    neighbourhood 
now  and  remember  all  the  Fairs  it  has  held  and  get 


20  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  noise  of  them  back  into  the  air  and  feel  the 
motley  multitudes  of  them  billowing  and  crushing  and 
striving  all  about  you  here.  Then,  with  a  thought, 
you  sweep  them  all  aside,  and  picture  that  seventeenth 
century  young  ruffian,  Defoe's  Colonel  Jack,  coming 
from  picking  pockets  in  other  parts  of  London  to 
try  his  luck  in  Smithfield  on  a  market  day,  his  black- 
guard comrade  Will  being  along  with  him  : 

"  It  fell  out  one  day  that,  as  we  were  strolling  about  in  West 
Smithfield  on  a  Friday,  there  happened  to  be  an  ancient  country 
gentleman  in  the  market,  selling  some  very  large  bullocks ; 
it  seems  they  came  out  of  Sussex.  His  worship,  for  so  they 
called  him,  had  received  the  money  for  these  bullocks  at  a 
tavern,  whose  sign  I  forget  now,  and  having  some  of  it  in  a  bag, 
and  the  bag  in  his  hand,  he  was  taken  with  a  sudden  fit  of 
coughing,  and  stands  to  cough,  resting  his  hand  with  the  bag 
of  money  in  it  upon  the  bulk-head  of  a  shop,  just  by  the  Cloister- 
gate  in  Smithfield,  that  is  to  say  within  three  or  four  doors  of 
it ;  we  were  both  just  behind  him.  Says  Will  to  me,  '  Stand 
ready  ; '  upon  this,  he  makes  an  artificial  stumble,  and  falls 
with  his  head  just  against  the  old  gentleman,  in  the  very 
moment  when  he  was  coughing,  ready  to  be  strangled,  and 
quite  spent  for  want  of  breath. 

"  The  violence  of  the  blow  beat  the  old  gentleman  quite 
down  ;  the  bag  of  money  did  not  immediately  fly  out  of  his 
hand,  but  I  ran  to  get  hold  of  it,  and  gave  it  a  quick  snatch, 
pulled  it  clean  away  and  ran  like  the  wind  down  the  Cloisters 
with  it,  turned  on  the  left  hand,  as  soon  as  I  was  through, 
and  out  into  Little  Britain,  so  into  Bartholomew  Close, 
then  across  Aldersgate  Street,  through  Paul's  Alley  into 
Redcross  Street,  and  so  across  all  the  streets,  through  innumer- 
able alleys,  and  never  stopped  till  I  got  into  the  second  quarter 
of  Moorfields,  our  old  agreed  rendezvous," 

You  may  follow  Colonel  Jack  in  his  flight  and  find 
the  streets  he  names,  or  you  may  select  one  of  these 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  21 

ancient  shops  beside  the  Cloisters'  gateway — shorn 
though  they  be  of  their  bulkheads — as  the  one  out- 
side which  the  incident  took  place.  But  you  shall 
see  Colonel  Jack  again  in  Smithfield.  The  officers 
are  on  the  track  of  his  friend  Will,  and  it  is  agreed 
that  the  Colonel  shall  fetch  away  certain  stolen 
plate  and  valuables  concealed  in  his  garret  and  sell 
them  to  raise  money  for  Will  to  escape  abroad  : 

"  If  I  should  offer  to  sell  it  anywhere/'  said  I,  "  they  will 
stop  me." 

"  As  for  that/'  says  Will,  "  I  could  sell  it  well  enough  if  I 
had  it,  but  I  must  not  be  seen  anywhere  among  my  old  acquaint- 
ance, for  I  am  blown,  and  they  will  betray  me  ;  but  I  will 
tell  you  where  you  shall  go  and  sell  it,  if  you  will,  and  they 
will  ask  you  no  questions,  if  you  give  them  the  word  that  I 
will  give  you."  So  he  gave  the  word,  and  directions  to  a 
pawnbroker  near  Cloth  Fair  ;  the  word  was  Good  tower  standard. 
Having  these  instructions,  he  said  to  me,  "  Colonel  Jack,  I 
am  sure  you  won't  betray  me ;  and  I  promise  you,  if  I  am 
taken  and  should  be  hanged,  I  won't  name  you.  I  will  go  to 
such  a  house  "  (naming  a  house  at  Bromley  by  Bow,  where  he 
and  I  had  often  been),  "  and  there,"  says  he,  "I'll  stay  till  it 
is  dark  ;  at  night  I  will  come  near  the  streets,  and  I  will  lay 
under  such  a  haystack  all  night  "  (a  place  we  both  knew  also 
V2ry  well),  "  and  if  you  cannot  finish  to  come  to  me  there,  I 
will  go  back  to  Bow." 

I  went  back  and  took  the  cargo,  went  to  the  place  by 
Cloth  Fair,  and  gave  the  word.  Good  tower  standard  ;  and  with- 
out any  words  they  took  the  plate,  weighed  it,  and  paid  me 
after  the  rate  of  2S.  per  ounce  for  it ;  so  I  came  away  and  went 
to  meet  him,  but  it  was  too  late  to  meet  him  at  the  first  place  ; 
but  I  went  to  the  haystack,  and  there  I  found  him  fast  asleep. 

Probably  that  pawnbroker  near  Cloth  Fair  was  in 
Long  Lane,  which  nuis  parallel  with   the   Fair  and 


22  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

is  connected  with  it  by  a  narrow  alley  ;  anyhow. 
Long  Lane  was  for  two  or  three  hundred  years 
famous  for  its  pawnshops,  second-hand  clothiers 
and  gaming  houses.  Jack  Hornet,  in  Webster's 
Northward  Ho  !  having  rigged  himself  out  in  a  showy 
second-hand  suit  calls  on  his  friends  to  admire  his 
bravery,  but  Doll  is  a  little  ambiguous  in  her  criticism 
and  cries  out,  "  WTiy,  I  tell  thee,  Jack  Hornet,  if 
the  devil  and  all  the  brokers  in  Long  Lane  had  rifled 
their  wardrobe  they  would  ha'  been  damned  before 
they  had  fitted  thee  thus." 

Coming  to  later  days  you  may  read  in  Thackeray's 
Adventures  of  Philip  how  Philip's  mother  promised 
to  go  to  the  Charterhouse  every  Saturday  to  see  him, 
and  did  not  keep  her  promise.  "  Smithfield  is  a 
long  way  from  Piccadilly ;  and  an  angry  cow  once 
scratched  the  panels  of  her  carriage,  causing  her 
footman  to  spring  from  his  board  into  a  pig-pen, 
and  herself  to  feel  such  a  shock  that  no  wonder  she 
was  afraid  of  visiting  the  city  afterwards."  And 
in  The  Neivcomes  you  go  with  stately  old  Colonel 
Newcome  when  he  "  dismissed  his  cab  at  Ludgate 
Hill  and  walked  thence  by  the  dismal  precincts  of 
Newgate,  and  across  the  muddy  pavement  of  Smith- 
field,  on  his  way  back  to  the  old  school  where  his 
son  was,  a  way  which  he  had  trodden  many  a  time 
in  his  own  early  days."  But  there  are  closer  and 
fuller  associations  with  Smithfield  in  Oliver  Twist 
and  in  Great  Expectations.  You  remember  how,  after 
Oliver  had  escaped  from  Fagin,  Nancy  and  Bill 
Sikes  recaptured  him  one  evening  in  Clerkenwell 
and  hurried  him  away  towards  Fagin's  den  in 
Field  Lane,  passing  near  Newgate,  in  which  certain 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  28 

of  their  friends  lay  under  sentence  of  death.     Let 
us  re-read  the  whole  passage  : 

"  The  narrow  streets  and  courts  at  length  terminated  in  a 
large  open  space  ;  scattered  about  which  were  pens  for  beasts, 
and  other  indications  of  a  cattle-market.  Sikes  slackened 
his  pace  when  they  reached  this  spot :  the  girl  being  quite 
unable  to  support  any  longer  the  rapid  rate  at  which  they 
had  hitherto  walked.  Turning  to  Oliver  he  roughly  com- 
manded him  to  take  hold  of  Nancy's  hand. 

"  '  Do  you  hear  ?  '  growled  Sikes,  as  Oliver  hesitated  and 
looked  round. 

"  They  were  in  a  dark  corner,  quite  out  of  the  track  of 
passengers.  Oliver  saw,  but  too  plainly,  that  resistance 
would  be  of  no  avail.  He  held  out  his  hand,  which  Nancy 
clasped  tightly  in  hers. 

"  '  Give  me  the  other,'  said  Sikes,  seizing  Oliver's  unoccupied 
hand.     '  Here,  Bull's-eye  1 ' 

"  The  dog  looked  up  and  growled. 

"  '  See  here,  boy  ! '  said  Sikes,  putting  his  other  hand  to 
Oliver's  throat ;  '  if  he  speaks  ever  so  soft  a  word,  hold  him  ! 
D'ye  mind  ?  ' 

"  The  dog  growled  again  ;  and  licking  his  lips  eyed  Oliver 
as  if  he  were  anxious  to  attach  himself  to  his  windpipe  without 
delay. 

"  '  He's  as  willing  as  a  Christian,  strike  me  blind  if  he  isn't  ! ' 
said  Sikes,  regarding  the  animal  with  a  kind  of  grim  and  ferocious 
approval.  '  Now,  you  know  what  you've  got  to  expect, 
master,  so  call  away  as  quick  as  you  like ;  the  dog  will 
soon  stop  that  game.     Get  on,  young  'un  ! ' 

"  Bull's-eye  wagged  his  tail  in  acknowledgement  of  this 
unusually  endearing  form  of  speech  ;  and,  giving  vent  to 
another  admonitory  growl  for  the  benefit  of  Oliver,  led  the 
way  onward. 

"  It  was  Smithfield  that  they  were  crossing,  although  it 
might  have  been  Grosvenor  Square  for  anything  Oliver  knew 
to  the  contrary.  The  night  was  dark  and  foggy.  The  lights 
in  the  shops  could  scarcely  struggle  through  the  heavy  mist 


24  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

which  thickened  every  moment  and  shrouded  the  streets  and 
houses  in  gloom,  rendering  the  strange  place  still  stranger  in 
Oliver's  eyes,  and  making  his  uncertainty  the  more  dismal 
and  depressing.  They  had  hurried  on  a  few  paces,  when  a 
deep  church-bell  struck  the  hour.  With  its  first  stroke,  his 
two  conductors  stopped,  and  turned  their  heads  in  the  direction 
whence  the  sound  proceeded. 

"  '  Eight  o'clock.  Bill,'  said  Nancy,  when  the  bell  ceased. 

"  '  What's  the  good  of  telling  me  that ;  I  can  hear  it,  can't 
I  ?  '  replied  Sikes. 

"  '  I  wonder  whether  they  can  hear  it,'  said  Nancy. 

"  '  Of  course  they  can,'  replied  Sikes.  '  It  was  Bartlemy 
time  when  I  was  shopped,  and  there  weren't  a  penny  trumpet 
in  the  Fair  as  I  couldn't  hear  the  squeaking  on.  Arter  I  was 
locked  up  for  the  night  the  row  and  din  outside  made  the 
thundering  old  jail  so  silent  that  I  could  almost  have  beat  my 
head  out  against  the  iron  plates  of  the  door.' 

"  '  Poor  fellows  ! '  said  Nancy,  who  still  had  her  face  turned 
towards  the  quarter  in  which  the  bell  had  sounded.  '  Oh, 
Bill,  such  fine  young  chaps  as  them  ! '  * 

"  '  Yes  ;  that's  all  you  women  think  of,'  answered  Sikes. 
'  Fine  young  chaps  !  Well,  they're  as  good  as  dead,  so  it  don't 
much  matter.' 

"  With  this  consolation,  Mr.  Sikes  appeared  to  repress  a 
rising  tendency  to  jealousy ;  and  clasping  Oliver's  wrist 
more  firmly  told  him  to  step  out  again. 

"  '  Wait  a  minute,'  said  the  girl :  '  I  wouldn't  hurry  by  if 
it  was  you  that  was  coming  out  to  be  hung  the  next  time 
eight  o'clock  struck,  Bill.  I'd  walk  round  and  round  the  place 
till  I  dropped,  if  the  snow  was  on  the  ground  and  I  hadn't  a 
shawl  to  cover  me.' 

"  '  And  what  good  would  that  do  ?  '  inquired  the  unsenti- 
mental Mr.  Sikes.  '  Unless  you  could  pitch  over  a  file  and 
twenty  yards  of  good  stout  rope,  you  might  as  well  be  walking 
fifty  mile  off,  or  not  walking  at  all,  for  all  the  good  it  would  do 
me.     Come  on,  will  you,  and  don't  stand  preaching  there.'  " 

With  that,  he  and  Nancy,  with  OUver  and  the  dog 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  25 

move  on  beyond  our  radius  and  vanish  into  the  fog. 
But  a  Uttle  later,  on  a  cheerless  morning  when  they 
set  out  towards  Chertsey,  where  Oliver  was  forced 
to  take  part  in  that  notorious  burglary,  he  and  Sikes 
passed  this  way  again,  and  incidentally  Dickens 
gives  you  a  vivid  picture  of  Smithfield  as  it  was  in 
the  1830's,  when  Oliver  Twist  was  written  : 

"  Turning  down  Sun  Street  and  Crown  Street,  and  crossing 
Finsbury  Square,  Mr.  Sikes  struck  by  way  of  Chiswell  Street, 
into  Barbican  :  thence  into  Long  Lane  :  and  so  into  Smith- 
field  ;  from  which  latter  place  arose  a  tumult  of  discordant 
sounds  that  filled  Oliver  Twist  with  surprise  and  amazement. 
It  was  market-morning.  The  ground  was  covered  nearly 
ankle-deep  with  filth  and  mire  ;  and  a  thick  steam,  perpetually 
rising  from  the  reeking  bodies  of  the  cattle  and  mingling  with 
the  fog,  which  seemed  to  rest  upon  the  chimney  tops,  hung 
heavily  above.  All  the  pens  in  the  centre  of  the  large  area  : 
and  as  many  temporary  ones  as  could  be  crowded  into  the 
vacant  space  :  were  filled  with  sheep  ;  tied  up  to  posts  by  the 
gutter  side  were  long  lines  of  beasts  and  oxen,  three  or  four 
deep.  Countrymen,  butchers,  drovers,  hawkers,  boys,  thieves, 
idlers  and  vagabonds  of  every  low  grade,  were  mingled  together 
in  a  dense  mass  ;  the  whistling  of  drovers,  the  barking  of  dogs, 
the  bellowing  and  plunging  of  oxen,  the  bleating  of  sheep, 
the  grunting  and  squeaking  of  pigs  ;  the  cries  of  hawkers, 
the  shouts,  oaths  and  quarrelling  on  all  sides  ;  the  ringing  of 
bells,  and  roar  of  voices  that  issued  from  every  public-house  ; 
the  crowding,  pushing,  driving,  beating,  whooping  and  yelling  ; 
the  hideous  and  discordant  din  that  resounded  from  every 
comer  of  the  market ;  and  the  unwashed,  unshaven,  squalid 
and  dirty  figures  constantly  running  to  and  fro  and  bursting 
in  and  out  of  the  throng  ;  rendered  it  a  stunning  and  bewildering 
scene  which  quite  confounded  the  senses. 

"  Mr.  Sikes,  dragging  Oliver  after  him,  elbowed  his  way 
through  the  thickest  of  the  crowd,  and  bestowed  very  little 
attention  on  the  numerous  sights  and  sounds  wliich  so  astonished 


26  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  boy.  He  nodded,  twice  or  thrice,  to  a  passing  friend  ; 
and,  resisting  as  many  invitations  to  take  a  morning  dram, 
pressed  steadily  onward,  until  they  were  clear  of  the  turmoil 
and  had  made  their  way  through  Hosier  Lane  into  Holborn. 

"  '  Now,  young  'un  ! '  said  Sikes,  looking  up  at  the  clock 
of  St.  Andrew's  Church,  '  hard  upon  seven  !  You  must  step 
out.     Come,  don't  lag  behind  already.  Lazy-legs  ! '  " 

Into  Smithfield,  from  St.  John  Street  Road,  came 
Noah  Claypole  and  his  Charlotte,  a  weedy,  grotesque 
couple,  Charlotte  carrying  their  bundle,  and  as  they 
were  making  for  that  disreputable  hostelry,  The 
Three  Cripples  in  Field  Lane,  where  they  also  were 
to  fall  in  with  Fagin,  it  is  probable  that  they  turned 
off  along  Charterhouse  Lane,  now  Charterhouse 
Street ;  and  in  that  same  street,  as  you  may  learn 
from  Pendemiis,  Mr.  Huxter  and  his  wife  had  lodg- 
ings. His  wife,  you  remember,  was  that  pretty 
Fanny  Bolton,  daughter  of  the  porter  of  Shepherd's 
Inn  ;  Pendennis  himself  had  been  wildly  in  love 
with  her  for  a  while,  and  whilst  he  cooled  his  passion 
resolutely  in  absence,  Fanny  consoled  herself  with 
Huxter,  a  medical  student  at  St.  Bartholomew's, 
in  Smithfield,  and  after  their  marriage  he  brought 
the  news  to  Pendennis,  and  invited  him  to  call  and 
see  them  : 

"  It's  in  Charterhouse  Lane,  over  the  baker's,  on  the  right 
hand  side  as  you  go  from  St.  John's  Street,"  as  old  Bows  who 
happens  to  be  present  explains.  "  You  know  Smithfield, 
Mr.  Pendennis  ?  St.  John's  Street  leads  into  Smithfield.  Dr. 
Johnson  has  been  down  the  street  many  a  time  with  ragged 
shoes  and  a  bundle  of  penny-a-lining  for  the  Gent's  Magazine. 
You  literary  gents  are  better  off  now — eh  ?  You  ride  in  your 
cabs  and  wear  yellow  kid  gloves  now." 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  27 

St.  John's  Street  (now  St.  John's  Lane)  still  retains 
something  of  its  old-world  atmosphere,  and  in  it 
still  is  the  ancient  gateway  in  the  room  over  which 
Johnson,  because  of  his  shabbiness,  used  to  take  a 
meal  behind  a  screen,  whilst  his  employer,  the  pub- 
lisher Cave,  was  entertaming  more  affluent  guests 
at  dinner.  But  it  is  no  use  looking  for  that  baker's 
shop,  for  Charterhouse  Lane  is  all  gone,  and  its  suc- 
cessor, Charterhouse  Street,  is  made  up  of  raw  new 
buildings  on  the  right  hand,  and  the  long,  low,  red- 
brick modem  Market  on  the  left. 

When  Nicholas  Nickleby  travelled  with  Mr.  Squeers 
to  Dotheboys  Hall  he  started  from  the  Saracen's 
Head,  on  Snow  Hill,  which  is  out  at  the  other  end 
of  Hosier  Lane,  and  the  coach  came  "  rattling  over 
the  stones  of  Smithfield  "  on  its  way  to  Islington. 
And  when  Pip,  in  Great  Expectations,  came  to  London, 
the  coach  set  him  down  at  the  Cross  Keys,  Wood 
Street,  off  Cheapside,  about  five  minutes'  walk  from 
the  office  of  that  remarkable  solicitor,  Mr.  J  aggers  : 

"  Mr.  Jaggers  had  duly  sent  me  his  address ;  it  was  Little 
Britain,  and  he  had  written  after  it  on  his  card,  '  just  out  of 
Smithfield  and  dose  by  the  coach-office.'  Nevertheless,  a 
hackney  coachman,  who  seemed  to  have  as  many  capes  to 
his  greasy  great-coat  as  he  was  years  old,  packed  me  up  in  his 
coach,  and  hemmed  me  in  with  a  folding  and  jingling  barrier 
of  steps,  as  if  he  were  going  to  take  me  fifty  miles.  His  getting 
on  his  box,  which  I  remember  to  have  been  decorated  with  an 
old  weather-stained  pea-green  hammercloth,  moth-eaten  into 
rags,  was  quite  a  work  of  time.  It  was  a  wonderful  equipage, 
with  six  great  coronets  outside,  and  ragged  things  behind 
for  I  don't  know  how  many  footmen  to  hold  on  by,  and  a 
harrow  below  them  to  prevent  amateur  footmen  from  yielding 
to  the  temptation.     I  had  scarcely  had  time  to  enjoy  the 


28  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

coach  and  to  think  how  like  a  straw-yard  it  was,  and  yet  how 
like  a  rag-shop,  when  I  observed  the  coachman  beginning  to 
get  down,  as  if  we  were  going  to  stop  presently.  And  stop  we 
presently  did,  in  a  gloomy  street,  at  certain  offices  with  an  open 
door,  whereon  was  painted  Mr.  Jaggers. 

"  '  How  much  ?  '  I  asked  the  coachman. 

"  The  coachman  answered,  '  A  shilling — unless  you  wish  to 
make  it  more,' 

"  I  naturally  said  I  did  not  wish  to  make  it  more. 

"  '  Then  it  must  be  a  shilling,'  observed  the  coachman.  *  I 
don't  want  to  get  into  trouble,  I  know  him  ! '  He  darkly  closed 
an  eye  at  Mr.  Jaggers's  name,  and  shook  his  head." 

There  are  some  old  houses  near  this  end  of  Little 
Britain  any  one  of  which  would  serve  as  Mr.  Jaggers's. 
As  that  gentleman  chanced  to  be  out  Pip  decided 
to  take  a  walk  and  come  back,  and  the  clerk  advised 
him  "to  go  round  the  corner  and  I  should  come 
into  Smithfield.  So  I  came  into  Smithfield ;  and 
the  shameful  place,  being  all  asmear  with  filth  and 
fat  and  blood  and  foam,  seemed  to  stick  to  me.  So 
I  rubbed  it  off  with  all  possible  speed  by  turning 
into  a  street  where  I  saw  the  great  black  dome  of 
St.  Paul's  bulging  at  me  from  behind  a  grim  stone 
building  which  a  bystander  said  was  Newgate  Prison." 
Smithfield  is  no  longer  the  littered,  dirty,  noisome 
spot  it  was  in  Pip's  day  ;  its  whole  traffic  nowadays 
is  in  dead  meat  which  is  sold  with  noise  enough  but 
in  cleanly  and  orderly  fashion  within  the  Market- 
walls,  the  live  sheep  and  cattle  going  farther  north 
to  Caledonian  Market,  where  they  are  disposed 
of  in  a  seemly  environment  and  slaughtered  as 
decently  and  scientifically  as  may  be  in  sanitary 
abbatoirs.  Returning  from  his  walk  round  New- 
gate, says  Pip  : 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  29 

"  I  dropped  into  the  office  to  ask  if  ^ilr.  Jaggers  had  come  in 
yet,  and  I  found  he  had  not,  and  I  strolled  out  again.  This 
time  I  made  the  tour  of  Little  Britain,  and  turned  into  Bartholo- 
mew Close  ;  and  now  I  became  aware  that  other  people  were 
waiting  about  for  Mr.  Jaggers,  as  well  as  I.  There  were  two 
men  of  secret  appearance  lounging  in  Bartholomew  Close, 
and  thoughtfully  fitting  their  feet  into  the  cracks  of  the  pave- 
ment as  they  talked  together,  one  of  whom  said  to  the  other 
when  they  first  passed  me,  that  '  Jaggers  would  do  it  if  it  was 
to  be  done.'  There  was  a  knot  of  three  men  and  two  women 
standing  at  a  comer,  and  one  of  the  women  was  crj'ing  on 
her  dirty  shawl,  and  the  other  comforted  her  by  saying,  as 
she  pulled  her  own  shawl  over  her  shoulders,  '  Jaggers  is  for 
him,  'MeUa,  and  what  more  could  you  have  ?  '  There  was  a 
red-eyed  Uttle  Jew  who  came  into  the  Close  while  I  was  loitering 
there,  in  company  with  a  second  little  Jew  whom  he  sent 
upon  an  errand  ;  and  while  the  messenger  was  gone,  I  remarked 
this  Jew,  who  was  of  a  highly  excitable  temperament,  per- 
forming a  jig  of  anxiety  under  a  lamp-post,  and  accompanying 
himself,  in  a  kind  of  frenzy,  with  the  words,  '  Oh,  Jaggerth, 
Jaggerth,  Jaggerth  !  all  otherth  ith  Cag-Maggerth,  give  me 
Jaggerth  ! '  These  testimonies  to  the  popularity  of  my 
guardian  made  a  deep  impression  on  me,  and  I  wondered 
and  wondered  more  than  ever. 

"  At  length,  as  I  was  looking  out  at  the  iron  gate  of  Bartholo- 
mew Close  into  Little  Britain,  I  saw  Mr.  Jaggers  coming  across 
the  road  towards  me.  All  the  others  who  were  waiting,  saw 
him  at  the  same  time,  and  there  was  quite  a  rush  at  him. 
Mr  Jaggers,  putting  a  hand  on  my  shoulder,  and  walking  me 
at  his  side  without  saying  anything  to  me,  addressed  himself 
to  his  followers. 

"  First  he  took  the  two  secret  men. 

"  '  Now,  I  have  nothing  to  say  to  you,'  said  Mr.  Jaggers, 
throwing  his  finger  at  them.  '  I  want  to  know  no  more  than 
I  know.  As  to  the  result,  it's  a  toss-up.  I  told  you  from 
the  first  it  was  a  toss-up.     Have  you  paid  Wemmick  ?  ' 

"  '  We  made  the  money  up  this  morning,  sir,'  said  one  of  the 
men  submissively,  while  the  other  perused  Mr.  Jaggerss  face. 


30  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  '  I  don't  ask  when  you  made  it  up,  or  where,  or  whether 
you  made  it  up  at  all.     Has  Wemmick  got  it  ?  ' 

"  '  Yes,  sir,'  said  both  the  men  together, 

"  '  Very  well ;  then  you  may  go.  Now,  I  won't  have  it ! ' 
said  Mr.  Jaggers,  waving  his  hand  at  them,  to  put  them  behind 
him.     '  If  you  say  a  word  to  me,  I'll  throw  up  the  case.' 

"  '  We  thought,  Mr.  Jaggers — '  one  of  the  men  began, 
pulling  off  his  hat, 

"  '  That's  what  I  told  you  not  to  do,'  said  Mr.  Jaggers.  '  You 
thought  !  I  think  for  ^'ou  ;  that's  enough  for  you.  If  I  want 
you,  I  know  where  to  nnd  you  ;  I  don't  want  you  to  find  me. 
Now  I  won't  have  it.     I  won't  hear  a  word.' 

"  The  two  men  looked  at  one  another  as  Mr.  Jaggers  waved 
them  behind  again,  and  humbly  fell  back  and  we  heard  no  more. 

"  '  And  now  you  ! '  said  Mr.  Jaggers,  suddenly  stopping,  and 
turning  on  the  two  women  with  the  shawls,  from  whom  the 
two  men  had  meekly  separated — '  Oh  !  Ameha,  is  it  }  ' 

"  '  Yes,  Mr.  Jaggers.' 

"  '  And  do  you  remember,'  retorted  Mr.  Jaggers,  '  that  but 
for  me  you  wouldn't  be  here  and  couldn't  be  here  }  ' 

"  '  Oh,  yes,  sir  ! '  exclaimed  both  women  together.  '  Lord 
bless  you,  sir,  well  we  knows  that ! ' 

"  '  Then  why,'  said  Mr.  Jaggers,  '  do  you  come  here  ?  ' 

"  '  My  Bill,  sir  ! '  the  crying  woman  pleaded. 

"  '  Now,  I  tell  you  what ! '  said  Mr.  Jaggers.  '  Once  for  all. 
If  you  don't  know  that  your  Bill's  in  good  hands,  I  know  it. 
And  if  you  come  here,  bothering  about  your  Bill,  I'll  make  an 
example  both  of  your  Bill  and  you,  and  let  him  shp  through 
my  fingers.     Have  you  paid  Wemmick  }  ' 

"  '  Oh,  yes,  sir  !    Every  farden.' 

"  '  Very  well.  Then  you  have  done  all  you  have  got  to  do. 
Say  another  word — one  single  word — and  Wemmick  shall 
give  you  your  money  back.' 

"  This  terrible  threat  caused  the  women  to  fall  off  immediately. 
No  one  remained  now  but  the  excitable  Jew,  who  had  already 
raised  the  skirts  of  Mr.  Jaggers's  coat  to  his  lips  several  times. 

"  '  I  don't  know  this  man  ?  '  said  Mr.  Jaggers,  in  the  most 
devastating  strain.     '  What  does  this  fellow  want  ?  ' 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  31 

"  '  Ma  thear  Mithter  Jaggerth.  Hown  brother  to  Habraham 
Latheruth  ?  ' 

"  '  Who's  he  ?  '  said  Mr.  Jaggers.     '  Let  go  of  my  coat.' 

"  The  suitor,  kissing  the  hem  of  the  garment  again  before 
reUnquishing  it,  replied,  '  Habratham  Latharuth,  on  thuth- 
pithion  of  plate.' 

"  '  You're  too  late,'  said  Mr.  Jaggers.     '  I  am  over  the  way.' 

" '  Holy  father,  Mithter  Jaggerth  ! '  cried  my  excitable 
acquaintance,  turning  white,  '  don't  thay  you're  again 
Habraham  Latharuth  ! ' 

"  '  I  am,'  said  Mr.  Jaggers,  *  and  there's  an  end  of  it.  Get 
out  of  the  way.' 

"  '  Mithter  Jaggerth  !  Half  a  moment  !  My  hown  cuthen'th 
gone  to  Mithter  Wemmick  at  thith  prethenth  minute  to  hoffer 
him  hany  termth.  Mithter  Jaggerth  !  Half  a  quarter  of  a 
moment  !  If  you'd  have  the  condethenthun  to  be  bought  off 
from  the  t'other  thide — at  any  thuperior  prithe  ! — money  no 
object — Mithter  Jaggerth — Mithter ' 

"  My  guardian  threw  his  suppliant  off  with  supreme  in- 
difference, and  left  him  dancing  on  the  pavement  as  if  it  were 
red-hot.  Without  further  interruption,  we  reached  the  front 
office." 

The  only  gateway  now  into  Bartholomew  Close 
is  in  front  of  the  church  ;  but  I  believe  there  used 
to  be  a  gateway  at  the  other  entrance  along  Little 
Britain,  and  it  was  at  this  corner  of  the  Close,  there- 
fore, that  they  left  the  Jew  dancing  on  the  pave- 
ment. And  this  was  not  Pip's  only  visit  to  the 
vicinity  of  Smithfield  ;  he  was  there  again  and  agahi, 
and  on  one  memorable  occasion  came  from  the  office 
in  Little  Britain  with  Wemmick  to  walk  westward 
and  dine  with  Mr.  Jaggers  at  his  house  in  Gerrard 
Street,  Soho  ;  and  didn't  he  start  from  here,  too, 
on  the  even  more  memorable  occasion  when  he  went 
home  with  Wemmick  and  made  acquaintance  with 


32  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  the  Ancient  Parent  "  ?  Strange,  how  as  the  years 
go  by  such  unrealities  become  real  and  the  world's 
realities  become  unreal.  We  know  that  on  a  certain 
June  evening  of  1381  Wat  Tyler  and  his  rebels 
marched  into  Smithfield  to  meet  and  parley  with 
King  Richard  II.  and  his  councillors  ;  that  this  is 
the  historic  ground  on  which  Sir  William  Wal- 
worth treacherously  stabbed  Tyler  whilst  they  were 
parleying,  and  that  the  dying  rebel — a  man  whom 
history  has  grossly  misjudged  and  maligned — 
was  carried  into  Bartholomew's  Hospital,  whence 
his  dead  body  was  dragged  next  day  that  it  might 
be  decapitated  and  his  head  exhibited  on  London 
Bridge.  But  Tyler  and  Richard  and  their  hosts 
are  as  very  shadows  as  are  Pip  and  Wemmick  and 
Mr.  Jaggers,  and  Smithfield  is  as  surely  haunted  by 
these  figures  that  never  existed  as  by  those  that 
have  ceased  to  exist. 

Perhaps  I  have  grown  the  more  interested  in  all 
that  concerns  Smithfield  because  of  a  private  and 
personal  association  I  have  with  it,  A  few  years 
ago  I  had  occasion  to  search  through  some  old  London 
Directories.  If  we  are  to  have  the  whole  truth,  I 
was  at  the  time  writing  an  article  on  Mr.  William 
De  Morgan  and  wanted  to  identify  his  birthplace, 
which  had  been  renumbered,  in  a  street  that  had 
been  renamed.  Glancing  through  the  Directories 
between  1834  and  1840  I  casually  came  upon  my 
own  name  :  "  Adcock,  St.  John.  Sheep  and  Cattle 
Dealer,  41,  West  Smithfield ;  "  and  guessed  that, 
of  course,  this  must  be  the  grandfather  after  whom 
I  had  been  named.  I  never  knew  him  ;  he  died 
some   twenty   years   before    I   was   born,    and   was 


M  iiilliiiiii 


S*^".'-'' 
i!'. 


^ _: ■••».  fred''Adcock. 


'''^-f''\J^^\J^ 


^^^^mm^ 


"  'I  he  house  vas  old,  /•iiilt  oj  nd  I  ticks  ii<ith  a  shrll  decoration  over  I  he  door." 
Besant's  "All  Sorts  and  Conditions  o/  Men."  C  ha  filer  <> 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  33 

younger  then  than  I,  his  grandson,  am  at  this  writ- 
ing ;    therefore  he  had  never  been  more  than  a  sort 
of  tradition  to  me.     I  had  heard  stories  of  him  when 
I  was  a  youngster  :    he  was  a  farmer  near  Oakham, 
and  from  time  to  time  during  the  year  he  sent  his 
drovers  afoot  with  sheep  and  cattle  to  London,  he 
himself  starting  a  day  or  two  later  to  travel  up  by 
coach  and  be  at  Smithfield  Market  by  the  time  they 
arrived    there.     It    was    returning    from    one    such 
journey  that  he  was  caught  in  the  snowstorm  that 
caused  his  death.     Yet,  somehow,  I  did  not,  except 
in  the  vaguest  fashion,  connect  him  with  Smithfield 
until  I  lighted  on  his  name  in  that  old  Directory  ; 
then  for  the  first   time  he  became  an  actuality  to 
me,  with  a  local  habitation.     I  found  from  certain 
old  maps    of  West   Smithfield  in   the  30's   that  41 
used  to  stand  on  the  southern  side  with  its  front 
windows  looking   across   into   Hosier  Lane  ;    it  was 
pulled  down  half  a  dozen  years  ago  to  make  room 
for  the  extension  of  Bartholomew's  Hospital ;    and 
when  I  go  by  there  now  I  have  an  eerie,  an  almost 
dreadful  sense  of  nearness  to  that  dead  man  who 
survives   in   me.     I   look   across   the   road  with   his 
eyes,   and  see  the  same  old  houses  he  must  have 
seen  every  time  he  came  from  the  doorway  of  his 
office,  and  even  though  he  died  so  long  before  I  was 
born,  when  I  am  here  it  is  easy  now  to  come  in  touch 
with  him.     No  doubt  he  saw  something  of  the  Fair 
in  its  later  years,  when  the  booths  and  freak-shows 
rose  betwixt   his   windows  and  the   red-tiled   Crown 
Tavern   opposite.      He   was   doing   business   here   in 
1837,    whilst    Dickens   was   publishing    Oliver   Twist, 
and  knew  Smithfield  when  it  was  exactly  as  Dickens 


34  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

sketched  it — exactly  as  Oliver  and  Bill  Sikes  saw 
it  that  misty  morning  as  they  pushed  through  the 
uproarious  crowd  and  made  their  way  among  the 
cattle-pens,  and  turned  up  Hosier  Lane,  across  the 
road,  and  went  tramping  up  it,  and  wdU  go  tramping 
up  it  until  Dickens  is  forgotten. 

Withal,  this  ancestor,  who  has  thus  become  so 
vividly  real  to  me,  is  not  more  real  than  Sikes  and 
Oliver,  than  Pip  and  Mr.  Jaggers,  Colonel  Jack, 
Zeal-of-the-Land  Busy,  and  the  other  imaginary 
people  who  move  amidst  the  myriad  Smithfield 
ghosts  of  those  who  were  once  human  and  alive, 
and  are  as  living  now  as  they  ;  he  is  not  more  real 
to  me  than  is  Bardolph  who,  according  to  the  Page 
in  Henry  IV.,  came  into  Smithfield  to  buy  a  horse 
for  Falstaff ;  he  is  certainly  not  more  real  than 
Falstaff  who  was  arrested  here  in  Giltspur  Street 
at  the  suit  of  Mistress  Quickly  :  she  loitered  here- 
abouts with  Fang  and  Snare,  the  Sheriff's  officers, 
waiting  for  Falstaff  to  put  in  an  appearance,  and 
assured  them,  "  A'  comes  continually  to  Pie-corner 
— saving  your  manhoods — to  buy  a  saddle.  .  .  . 
Yonder  he  comes  ;  and  that  arrant  malmsey-nose 
knave,  Bardolph,  with  him.  Do  your  offices,  do  your 
offices,  Master  Fang  and  Master  Snare ;  do  me,  do 
me,  do  me  your  offices  !  " 

At  this  end  of  Giltspur  Street,  before  we  come  to 
Pie  Corner,  by  the  way,  is  the  site  of  the  chemist's 
shop  at  which  the  hero  of  Marryat's  Japhet  in  Search 
of  a  Father  served  his  apprenticeship.  One  side  of 
Giltspur  Street  runs  flush  with  the  side  of  Smith- 
field  ;  the  other  side  ends  in  a  comer,  where  the 
broken   square   of   Smithfield   begins   to   fall   away 


PERSONAL  AND  GENERAL  35 

from  it ;  and  here,  as  Japhet  Newland  tells  you 
himself,  was  the  home  he  was  sent  to  from  the 
Foundling  Hospital  : 

"  The  practitioner  who  thus  took  me  by  the  hand  was  a 
Mr.  Phineas  Cophagus^  whose  house  was  most  conveniently 
situated  for  business,  one  side  of  the  shop  looking  upon  Smith- 
field  Market,  the  other  presenting  a  surface  of  glass  to  the 
principal  street  leading  out  of  the  same  market.  It  was  a 
corner  house,  but  not  in  a  corner.  On  each  side  of  the  shop 
were  two  gin  establishments,  and  next  to  them  were  two 
public-houses,  and  then  two  eating-houses,  frequented  by 
graziers,  butchers  and  drovers.  Did  the  men  drink  so  much 
as  to  quarrel  in  their  cups,  w^ho  was  so  handy  to  plaster  up 
the  broken  heads  as  Mr.  Cophagus  ?  Did  a  fat  grazier  eat 
himself  into  an  apoplexy,  how  ver\'  convenient  was  the  ready 
lancet  of  Mr.  Cophagus.  Did  a  bull  gore  a  man,  Mr.  Cophagus 
appeared  with  his  diachylon  and  hnt.  Did  an  ox  frighten  a 
lady,  it  was  in  the  back  parlour  that  she  was  recovered  from 
her  syncope.  Market-days  were  a  sure  market  to  my  master  ; 
and  if  an  overdriven  beast  knocked  down  others,  it  only  helped 
to  set  him  on  his  legs." 

But  not  always  ;  for  a  day  came  when  a  noisy 
crowd  of  people  went  tearing  past  the  shop.  Mr. 
Cophagus,  thinking  they  were  in  pursuit  of  a  bull, 
ran  out  and  stood  on  the  pavement  to  stare  after 
them,  but  it  chanced  to  be  the  bull  that  was  doing 
the  pursuing,  and  it  suddenly  took  the  unfortunate 
chemist  in  the  rear  and  flung  him  through  his  own 
window  on  to  the  counter  inside,  and  then  burst 
in  at  the  doorway  after  him.  Japhet  and  another 
apprentice  pulled  their  master  down  behind  the 
counter,  and  some  butcher-boys  captured  the  beast 
and  dragged  it  out  with  the  scales  swinging  on  its 
horns.     But  Mr.  Cophagus  was   so   badly   damaged 


36  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

that  he  had  to  call  in  a  rival  chemist  to  attend  to 
his  injuries,  and  one  result  of  the  catastrophe  was 
the  sale  of  his  business  to  this  rival,  which  left  Japhet 
unemployed  and  free  to  fulfil  a  long-cherished  desire 
and  go  in  search  of  his  unknown  father. 

So  miraculously  haunted  is  all  Smithfield  that  I 
have  secret  yearnings  to  spend  a  night  in  the  old, 
old  house  that  rises,  looking  as  if  it  were  built  of  the 
very  stuff  of  dreams,  above  the  gateway  in  front 
of  Bartholomew  Church.  There  is  a  sly,  eerie,  very 
little  attic  window  at  the  top  of  it,  and  I  am  almost 
sure  that  if  I  could  be  up  there  peering  out  from  it 
between  twelve  and  one  of  some  still,  misty  morning, 
I  should  see  all  the  varied  past  of  Smithfield  reacted 
under  my  eyes,  as  they  say  a  man  can  relive  all  the 
years  of  his  own  past  in  the  tense  minute  of  drown- 
ing. But  I  shall  never  risk  making  the  experiment 
— for  in  my  heart  I  am  afraid  to  ;  and  you  shall 
guess  for  yourself  whether  I  am  most  afraid  of  seeing 
things  or  of  not  seeing  them. 


CHAPTER  II 

"  THE  Saracen's  head  "  and  newgate 

LEAVING  Smithfield  by  Giltspiir  Street,  we  come 
to  the  corner  of  Newgate  Street,  with  the  new 
Sessions  House,  replacing  the  old  Newgate  Jail, 
across  the  road  in  front,  and  St.  Sepulchre's  church 
across  the  road  to  our  right.  It  was  St.  Sepulchre's 
clock  that  Nanc}^  and  Sikes  heard  striking  eight. 
The  first  martyr  burnt  in  Smithfield  in  the  reign  of 
Queen  Mary  was  John  Rogers,  vicar  of  this  church  ; 
it  was  St.  Sepulchre's  beU  that  for  over  two  centuries 
was  tolled  whenever  a  prisoner  was  brought  from 
Newgate  for  execution,  and  for  nearly  as  long  a 
period  it  was  customary  for  the  cart  conveying  the 
condemned  man  to  Tyburn  to  stop  before  the  church 
gate  whilst  a  nosegay  was  presented  to  the  prisoner. 
Some  thoughtful  merchant  bequeathed  a  fund  for 
this  melancholy  purpose  ;  and  another,  more  morbid 
and  less  thoughtful,  left  another  fund  out  of  which 
the  clerk  was  to  be  paid  to  go  across  the  road,  the 
night  before  an  execution,  toll  a  hand-bell  (which 
is  still  preserved  in  the  vestry)  twelve  times  under 
the  window  of  the  condemned  cell  and  recite  a  homily 
to  the  poor  awakened  wretch  inside,  reminding  him 
he  was  to  die  in  the  morning  and  had  better 
repent.  Sixteen-String-Jack  is  said  to  have  received 
his  nosegay  here,  at  the  church  gate,  and  you  may 

37 


38  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

remember  that  other  highwaymen  heroes  of  Ains- 
worth's  novels  did  not  fail  to  receive  a  like  delicate 
attention. 

Before  Holborn  Viaduct  was  erected,  Pip  would 
come  up  Holborn  Hill  from  his  rooms  in  Barnard's 
Inn  whenever  he  went  to  call  on  Mr.  J  aggers.  He 
travelled  this  same  way  too  after  he  and  Herbert 
Pocket  shared  chambers  in  the  Temple,  and  I  recall 
how  the  two  came  one  morning  during  those  terrible 
weeks  when  he  had  Magwitch,  the  convict,  in  hiding 
— Herbert  quitting  him  here  and  continuing  along 
Newgate  Street  to  his  business  further  in  town. 
"  Early  next  morning,"  goes  the  story,  "  we  went 
out  together,  and  at  the  corner  of  Giltspur  Street 
by  Smithfield,  I  left  Herbert  to  go  on  his  way 
into  the  city,  and  took  my  way  to  Little  Britain." 
Before  we  follow  on  Herbert's  track  let  us  cross  the 
road  and  stroll  down  Snow  Hill,  immediately  on 
the  other  side  of  St.  Sepulchre's,  for  half  way  down 
the  hill  is,  or  was,  that  famous  coaching  Inn,  the 
Saracen's  Head.  It  was  a  pleasant  and  pious  thought 
to  preserve  the  old  name  on  the  new  building  that 
has  replaced  it  and  to  decorate  its  frontage  with  a 
bust  of  Dickens  and  statues  of  Nicholas  Nickleby 
and  Mr.  Wackford  Squeers,  for  the  Saracen's  Head 
used  to  be  Squeers's  head-quarters  when  he  was  in 
London.  At  the  foot  of  his  advertisements  for 
new  pupils  he  would  announce  :  "  Mr.  Squeers  is  in 
town,  and  attends  daily,  from  one  till  four,  at  the 
Saracen's  Head,  Snow  Hill ;  "  and  on  one  occa- 
sion he  added  :  "  N.B. — An  able  assistant  wanted. 
Annual  salary  £5.  A  Master  of  Arts  would  be  pre- 
ferred."    It  was  this  addition  to  his  announcement 


"  SARACEN'S  HEAD  "  AND  NEWGATE    39 

that  brought  Nicholas  to  the  Inn  with  his  uncle, 
Ralph  Nickleby,  and  he  rode  from  here  on  the 
Saracen's  Head  coach  to  take  up  the  appointment. 
Round  by  the  Old  Bailey,  at  that  date,  and  along 
Newgate  Street  spread  the  straggling,  disorderly 
Newgate  Market,  swarming  with  meat  and  fish  and 
vegetable  stalls  ;  and  Fleet  Market  was  down  in 
the  deep  valley,  where  Farringdon  Street  runs  now- 
adays spanned  by  the  Viaduct.  A  quiet,  dull, 
drearily  respectable  business  neighbourhood  now ; 
wholly  unlike  the  Snow  Hill  of  1688,  when  John 
Bunyan  died  at  a  grocer's  shop  here  ;  and  wholly 
unlike  what  it  was  too  when  Nicholas  Nickleby  saw 
it  less  than  a  century  ago  : 

"  Snow  Hill  !  What  kind  of  a  place  can  the  quiet  town's- 
people  who  see  the  words  emblazoned  in  all  the  legibility  of 
gilt  letters  and  dark  shading  on  the  north-country  coaches, 
take  Snow  Hill  to  be  ?  All  people  have  some  undefined  and 
shadowy  notion  of  a  place  whose  name  is  frequently  before 
their  eyes  or  often  in  their  ears,  and  what  a  vast  number  of 
random  ideas  there  must  be  perpetually  floating  about  regarding 
this  same  Snow  Hill.  The  name  is  such  a  good  one.  Snow 
Hill — Snow  Hill,  too,  coupled  with  a  Saracen's  Head  :  picturing 
to  us  by  a  double  association  of  ideas,  something  stem  and 
rugged.  A  bleak  desolate  tract  of  country,  open  to  piercing 
blasts  and  fierce  wintry  storms — a  dark,  cold  and  gloomy 
heath,  lonely  by  day,  and  scarcely  to  be  thought  of  by  honest 
folks  at  night — a  place  which  solitary  wayfarers  shun,  and 
where  desperate  robbers  congregate  ; — this,  or  something  like 
this,  we  imagine  must  be  the  prevalent  notion  of  Snow  Hill 
in  those  remote  and  rustic  parts  through  which  the  Saracen's 
Head,  like  some  grim  apparition,  rushes  each  day  and  night 
with  mysterious  and  ghost-like  punctuality,  holding  its  swift 
and  headlong  cour.se  in  all  weathers,  and  seeming  to  bid  defiance 
to  the  very  elements  themselves. 


40  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  The  reality  is  rather  different,  but  by  no  means  to  be 
despised,  notwithstanding.  There,  at  the  very  core  of  London, 
in  the  heart  of  its  business  and  animation,  in  the  midst  of  a 
whirl  of  noise  and  motion  :  stemming  as  it  were  the  giant 
currents  of  life  that  flow  ceaselessly  on  from  different  quarters 
and  meet  beneath  its  walls,  stands  Newgate  ;  and  in  that 
crowded  street  on  which  it  frowns  so  darkly — within  a  few 
feet  of  the  squalid  tottering  houses — upon  the  very  spot  upon 
which  the  venders  of  soup  and  fish  and  damaged  fruit  are  now 
plying  their  trades — scores  of  human  beings,  amidst  a  roar 
of  sounds  to  which  even  the  tumult  of  a  great  city  is  as  nothing, 
four,  six,  or  eight  strong  men  at  a  time,  have  been  hurried 
violently  and  swiftly  from  the  world,  when  the  scene  has  been 
rendered  frightful  with  the  excess  of  human  life  ;  when  curious 
eyes  have  glared  from  casement  and  housetop  and  wall  and 
pillar,  and  when,  in  the  mass  of  white  and  upturned  faces, 
the  dying  wretch  in  his  all-comprehensive  look  of  agony 
has  met  not  one — not  one — that  bore  the  impress  of  pity  or 
compassion. 

"  Near  to  the  jail,  and  by  consequence  near  to  Smithfield 
also,  and  the  Compter  and  the  bustle  and  noise  of  the  city  ; 
and  just  on  that  particular  part  of  Snow  Hill  where  omnibus 
horses  going  eastwards  seriously  think  of  falling  down  on 
purpose,  and  where  horses  in  hackney  cabriolets  going  west- 
wards not  unfrequently  fall  by  accident,  is  the  coach-yard  of 
the  Saracen's  Head  Inn,  its  portal  guarded  by  two  Saracens' 
heads  and  shoulders,  which  it  was  once  the  pride  and  glory 
of  the  choice  spirits  of  this  metropolis  to  pull  down  at  night, 
but  which  have  for  some  time  remained  in  undisputed  tranquil- 
lity ;  possibly  because  this  species  of  humour  is  now  confined 
to  St.  James's  parish,  where  door-knockers  are  preferred  as 
being  more  portable,  and  bell-wires  esteemed  as  convenient 
tooth-picks.  Whether  this  be  the  reason  or  not,  there  they 
are,  frowning  upon  you  from  each  side  of  the  gateway,  and 
the  Inn  itself,  garnished  with  another  Saracen's  Head,  frowns 
upon  you  from  the  top  of  the  yard  ;  while  from  the  door  of 
the  hind  boot  of  the  red  coaches  that  are  standing  therein 
there  glares  a  small  Saracen's  Head  with  a  twin  expression 


"  SARACEN'S  HEAD  "  AND  NEWGATE   41 

to  the  large  Saracen's  Head  below,  so  that  the  general  appear- 
ance of  the  pile  is  of  the  Saracenic  order. 

"  WTien  you  walk  up  the  yard,  you  will  see  the  booking- 
office  on  your  left,  and  the  tower  of  St.  Sepulchre's  church 
darting  abruptly  up  into  the  sky  on  your  right,  and  a  gallery 
of  bedrooms  on  both  sides.  Just  before  you,  you  will  observe 
a  long  window  with  the  words  '  coffee-room  '  legibly  painted 
above  it ;  and  looking  out  of  that  window  you  would  have 
seen  in  addition,  if  you  had  gone  at  the  right  time,  Mr.  Wackford 
Squeers  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets." 

Later  in  the  story  you  get  another  glimpse  of  the 
Saracen's  Head  when  John  Browdie  is  staying  there, 
with  Tilda  his  wife,  and  Nicholas  visits  it  again  to 
see  them.  But  the  only  part  of  Dickens's  descrip- 
tion that  can  still  be  identified  is  the  view  of  St. 
Sepulchre's  tower  darting  abruptly  up  into  the  sky 
on  your  right.  The  market  is  gone  ;  no  crowds 
ever  assemble  now  in  the  Old  Bailey  to  witness  a 
public  execution,  and  the  hill  has  been  so  levelled 
up  and  levelled  down  that  no  self-respecting  horse 
would  think  of  taking  any  notice  of  it.  The  Compter 
has  gone,  too  :  it  used  to  stand  in  Giltspur  Street 
where  the  long,  low  railings  shut  in  the  yard  of  the 
new  Post  Office  buildings,  which  you  may  notice 
as  we  go  back  to  the  comer  of  Newgate  Street.  If 
that  were  Newgate  Jail  across  the  road,  instead  of 
merely  the  new  Sessions  House  that  has  superseded 
it  and  reproduces  something  of  its  form,  we  might 
loiter  here  over  the  memories  of  such  glamorous 
rascals  as  Jonathan  Wild  and  Jack  Sheppard  :  they 
both  went  hence  on  their  last  journey  to  Tyburn, 
and  before  he  was  captured  for  the  last  time,  from 
the   old  prison  the  redoubtable   Jack   escaped  over 


42  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  roofs  of  the  Newgate  shops  and  reached  the  street 
by  sneaking  down  through  an  attic  window.  We 
should  have  to  linger  over  the  memories  of  scores 
such  as  these  who,  since  Fielding  and  Ainsworth 
made  heroes  of  them,  belong  as  much  to  fiction  as 
to  fact  ;  over  the  memories  of  as  many  more  who 
belong  to  fact  wholly,  and  of  as  many  more  who 
belong  wholly  to  fiction  ;  but  this  is  not  the  place 
that  they  knew.  Not  in  this  building  was  Esmond 
imprisoned ;  and  not  in  this  building  did  Dennis 
the  hangman  carry  on  his  gruesome  trade  ;  these 
are  not  the  very  doors  that  were  burst  open  by 
Barnaby  Rudge  and  the  Gordon  rioters  ;  nor  are 
these  the  same  walls  that  Nancy  had  in  mind  when 
she  said  she  would  walk  round  them  all  night  if 
Sikes  were  shut  within,  as,  a  little  later,  Fagin  was 
shut  within  them  ;  but  still  fronting  the  new  Sessions 
House  in  the  Old  Bailey,  survives  a  solitary  ancient 
Inn  from  the  windows  of  which  members  of  the  general 
public  looked  down  to  see  Fagin  hanged  one  morning, 
and  hereabouts,  opening  on  Newgate  Street,  was  the 
narrow,  grated  window  of  the  condemned  cell  in  which 
the  frantic  Jew  agonised  all  the  night  before  : 

"  He  cowered  down  upon  his  stone  bed,  and  thought  of  the  past. 
He  had  been  wounded  with  some  missiles  from  the  crowd  on 
the  day  of  his  capture,  and  his  head  was  bandaged  with  a  Hnen 
cloth.  His  red  hair  hung  down  upon  his  bloodless  face  ;  his 
beard  was  torn  and  twisted  into  knots  ;  his  eyes  shone  with  a 
terrible  light ;  his  unwashed  flesh  crackled  with  the  fever  that 
burnt  him  up.  Eight — nine — ten.  If  it  was  not  a  trick  to 
frighten  him,  and  those  were  the  real  hours  treading  on  each 
other's  heels,  where  would  he  be  when  they  came  round  again  ! 
Eleven  !    Another  struck,  before  the  voice  of  the  previous 


"  SARACEN'S  HEAD  "  AND  NEWGATE   43 

hour  had  ceased  to  vibrate.  At  eight,  he  would  be  the  only 
mourner  in  his  own  funeral  train  ;  at  eleven 

"  Those  dreadful  walls  of  Newgate,  which  have  hidden  so 
much  misery  and  such  unspeakable  anguish,  not  only  from  the 
eyes,  but  too  often  and  too  long  from  the  thoughts  of  men, 
never  held  so  dread  a  spectacle  as  that.  The  few  who  lingered 
as  they  passed  and  wondered  what  the  man  was  doing  who 
was  to  be  hanged  tomorrow,  would  have  slept  but  ill  that  night 
if  they  could  have  seen  him.  From  early  in  the  evening  until 
nearly  midnight,  little  groups  of  two  and  three  presented 
themselves  at  the  lodge-gate,  and  inquired  with  anxious  faces 
whether  any  reprieve  had  been  received.  These  being  answered 
in  the  negative,  communicated  the  welcome  intelligence  to 
clusters  in  the  street,  who  pointed  out  to  one  another  the  door 
from  which  he  must  come  out,  and  showed  where  the  scaffold 
would  be  built  and,  walking  with  unwilling  steps  away,  turned 
back  to  conjure  up  the  scene.  By  degrees  they  fell  ofif,  one 
by  one  ;  and  for  an  hour,  in  the  dead  of  night,  the  street  was 
left  to  solitude  and  darkness. 

"  The  space  before  the  prison  was  cleared,  and  a  few  strong 
barriers,  painted  black,  had  already  been  thrown  across  the 
road  to  break  the  pressure  of  the  expected  crowd,  when  Mr. 
Brownlow  and  Oliver  appeared  at  the  wicket,  and  presented 
an  order  of  admission  to  the  prisoner,  signed  by  one  of  the 
sheriffs.     They  were  immediately  admitted  into  the  lodge. 

"  ,  .  ,  Day  was  dawning  when  they  again  emerged.  A 
great  multitude  had  already  assembled  :  the  windows  were 
filled  with  people,  smoking  and  playing  cards  to  beguile  the 
time  ;  the  crowd  were  pushing,  c|uarrclling  and  joking.  Every- 
thing told  of  life  and  animation,  but  one  dark  cluster  of  objects 
in  the  very  centre  of  all — the  black  stage,  the  cross-beam, 
the  rope,  and  all  the  hideous  apparatus." 

Nearly  all  those  windows  are  gone,  like  the  audience 
that  sat  in  them  ;  but  opposite  the  spot  where  the 
gallows  used  to  be  erected  there  still  remains  that 
old  tavern,  The  King  of  Denmark,  and  you  may  be 


44  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

sure  that  some  of  those  smokers  and  card-players 
sat  at  its  open  windows  in  the  long  past — not  so 
long  past  as  it  ought  to  be,  for  the  last  execution 
outside  Newgate  took  place  less  than  fifty  years 
ago — and  looked  down  on  the  ghoulish  mobs  that 
gathered  to  enjoy  those  grisly  tragedies  of  justice. 
But  if  it  is  hard  to  look  along  the  staid  business 
thoroughfare  to-day  and  imagine  that  such  things 
ever  happened  in  it,  I  find  it  harder  to  realise  that 
at  this  end  of  the  Old  BaUey,  within  a  hundred  yards 
of  the  site  reserved  to  the  gallows,  was  that  squalid 
Green  Arbour  Court  in  which  Goldsmith  lived,  yet 
at  the  very  mention  of  his  name  there  is  a  thin, 
melancholy  echo  trembling  through  the  rumble  of 
traffic  and  I  can  hear  him  again  playing  his  flute 
there  of  evenings,  forgetful  of  his  debts  and  of  his 
duns.  Surely,  next  to  the  Tower,  this  ground  on 
which  Newgate  stands  is  the  grimmest,  most  darkly 
tragic  square  of  earth  in  all  London.  It  was  easy 
enough  to  pull  down  the  terrible  old  JaU  and  cart 
its  stones  away,  but  not  so  easy  to  cleanse  its  atmo- 
sphere and  wipe  out  all  its  searing  recollections — 
the  atmosphere  of  its  past  envelops  it  for  ever  and 
its  ghosts  linger  homeless  to  hover  about  the  new 
building,  so  that  a  nameless  gloom  overshadows  it 
and  it  begins  to  wear  a  brooding  and  a  haunted  air 
already. 

In  Besant's  eighteenth-century  story.  The  Orange 
Girl,  William  Halliday,  son  of  the  Thames  Street 
Merchant,  Sir  Peter  Halliday,  tells  how  his  down- 
fall was  compassed  by  his  enemies  and  he  was  sent  a 
prisoner  to  the  Newgate  of  that  time  and  of  the  rascally 
fashion  in  which  the  place  was  then  conducted  : 


"  SARACEN'S  HEAD  "  AND  NEWGATE    45 

"  A  man  must  be  made  of  brass  or  wrought-iron  who  can 
enter  the  gloomy  portals  of  Newgate  as  a  prisoner  without  a 
trembling  of  the  limbs  and  a  sinking  of  the  heart.  Not  even 
consciousness  of  innocence  is  sufficient  to  sustain  a  prisoner, 
for,  alas  !  even  the  innocent  are  sometimes  found  guilty. 
Once  within  the  first  doors  I  was  fain  to  lay  hold  upon  the 
nearest  turnkey  or  I  should  have  fallen  into  a  swoon  ;  a  thing 
which,  they  tell  me,  happens  with  many,  for  the  first  entrance 
into  prison  is  worse  to  the  imagination  even  than  the  standing 
up  in  the  dock  to  take  one's  trial  in  open  court.  There  is, 
in  the  external  aspect  of  the  prison  :  in  the  gloom  which  hangs 
over  the  prison  :  in  the  mixture  of  despair  and  misery  and 
drunkenness  and  madness  and  remorse  which  fills  the  prison, 
an  air  which  strikes  terror  to  the  very  soul.  They  took  me 
into  a  large,  vaulted  ante-room,  lit  by  windows  high  up,  with 
the  turnkey's  private  room  opening  out  of  it,  and  doors  leading 
into  the  interior  parts  of  the  Prison.  The  room  was  filled 
with  people  waiting  their  turn  to  visit  the  prisoners  ;  they 
carried  baskets  and  packages  and  bottles  ;  their  provisions, 
in  a  word,  for  the  Prison  allows  the  prisoners  no  more  than 
one  small  loaf  of  bread  every  day.  Some  of  the  visitors  were 
quiet,  sober  people  :  some  were  women  on  whose  cheeks  lay 
tears  :  some  were  noisy,  reckless  young  men,  who  laughed 
over  the  coming  fate  of  their  friends  ;  spoke  of  Tyburn  Fair  ; 
of  kicking  off  the  shoes  at  the  gallows  ;  of  dying  game  ;  of 
Newgate  music — meaning  the  clatter  of  irons ;  of  whining 
and  snivelling,  and  so  forth.  They  took  in  wine,  or  perhaps 
rum  under  the  name  of  wine.  There  were  also  girls  whose 
appearance  and  manner  certainly  did  not  seem  as  if  sorrow 
and  sympathy  with  the  unfortunate  had  alone  brought  them 
to  this  place.  Some  of  the  girls  also  carried  bottles  of  wine 
with  them  in  baskets." 

The  Governor  having  ordered  him  to  be  taken  in 
and  ironed,  Halliday  admitted,  to  the  great  disgust 
of  the  turnkey,  that  he  had  no  money,  and  as  he 
could  not  pay  to  be  accommodated  comfortably  on 


46  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  State  side,  or  on  the  Master's  side  of  the  prison, 
he  had  to  herd  with  the  general  swarm  of  poor 
criminal  wretches  who  were  granted  no  privileges 
because  they  could  not  afford  to  buy  any : 

"  The  common  side  of  Newgate  is  a  place  which,  though 
I  was  in  it  no  more  than  two  hours  or  so,  remains  fixed  in  my 
memory  and  will  stay  there  as  long  as  life  remains.  The 
yard  was  filled  to  overflowing  with  a  company  of  the  vilest, 
the  filthiest,  the  most  shameless  that  it  is  possible  to  imagine. 
They  were  pickpockets,  footpads,  shoplifters,  robbers  of  every 
kind  ;  they  were  in  rags  ;  they  were  unwashed  and  unshaven  ; 
some  of  them  were  drunk  ;  some  of  them  emaciated  by  in- 
sufficient food — a  penny  loaf  a  day  was  doled  out  to  those  who 
had  no  money  and  no  friends  :  that  was  actually  all  that  the 
poor  wretches  had  to  keep  body  and  soul  together ;  the  place 
was  crowded  not  only  with  the  prisoners,  but  with  their  friends 
and  relations  of  both  sexes  ;  the  noise,  the  cursings,  the  ribald 
laugh  ;  the  drunken  song  ;  the  fighting  and  quarrelling  can 
never  be  imagined.  And  in  the  narrow  space  of  the  yard, 
which  is  like  the  bottom  of  a  deep  well,  there  is  no  air  moving, 
so  that  the  stench  is  enough,  at  first,  to  make  a  horse  sick. 
I  can  liken  it  to  nothing  but  a  sty  too  narrow  for  the  swine 
that  crowded  it ;  so  full  of  unclean  beasts  was  it,  so  full  of 
noise  and  pushing  and  quarrelling  ;  so  full  of  passions,  jealousies, 
and  suspicions  ungoverned,  was  it.  Or  I  would  Uken  it  to  a 
chamber  in  hell  when  the  sharp  agony  of  physical  suffering 
is  for  a  while  changed  for  the  equal  pains  of  such  companionship 
and  such  discourse  as  those  of  the  Common  side.  I  stood 
near  the  door  as  the  turnkey  had  pushed  me  in,  staring  stupidly 
about.  Some  sat  on  the  stone  bench  with  tobacco-pipes  and 
pots  of  beer  :  some  played  cards  on  the  bench  :  some  walked 
about :  there  were  women  visitors,  but  not  one  whose  face 
showed  shame  or  sorrow.  To  such  people  as  these  Newgate 
is  like  an  occasional  attack  of  sickness  ;  a  whipping  is  but  one 
symptom  of  the  disease  :  imprisonment  is  the  natural  cure 
of  the  disease ;    hanging  is  the  only  natural,  common  and 


"SARACEN'S  HEAD"  AND  NEWGATE     47 

inevitable  end  when  the  disease  is  incurable,  just  as  death  in 
his  bed  happens  to  a  man  with  fever." 

It  was  the  custom  for  a  new  prisoner  to  pay  his 
footing,  and  as  Halliday  was  penniless,  the  other 
prisoners  fell  upon  him  violently  and  stripped  him  of 
his  coat  and  waistcoat,  shoes  and  stockings,  that  they 
might  sell  these  and  divide  the  proceeds.  I  think 
it  should  chasten  the  highest  and  most  respectable 
of  us  to  reflect  that  this  was  the  best  our  ruling 
caste  could  do  in  the  way  of  managing  a  Prison 
not  a  century  and  a  half  ago  ;  for  the  picture  is 
a  perfectly  true  one  though  the  characters  in  it 
are  fictitious.  You  have  glimpses  of  a  similar 
state  of  affairs  in  the  Newgate  scenes  of  Fielding's 
satirical  masterpiece,  Jonathan  Wild  ;  and  the  plain 
contemporary  records  of  fact  show  that  neither  he 
nor  Besant  exaggerated.  Later  in  The  Orange  Girl 
there  is  a  vivid  description  of  a  trial  at  the  Old 
Bailey ;  but  for  a  more  dramatic  and  far  more 
memorable  trial-scene  you  must  turn  to  A  Tale 
of  Two  Cities — for  it  was  at  the  Old  Bailey  that 
Sydney  Carton  stood  up  in  Court  and  secured  the 
acquittal  of  the  accused,  on  a  point  of  identity,  by 
calling  attention  to  the  astonishing  facial  resemblance 
betwixt  himself  and  Charles  Damay. 

There  is  a  striking  Newgate  jail  scene  in  Besant 's 
other  eighteenth-century  novel,  No  Other  Way, 
where  the  pretty,  shrinking  widow,  Mrs  Weyland, 
comes  here  to  marry  the  negro  who  is  condemned 
to  be  executed  to-morrow — she  is  hopelessly  in  debt, 
and  in  the  event  of  her  marrying,  the  law  would 
then  transfer  all  responsibility  for  her  debts  to  her 
husband.     And  there  is  a  good  account  of  a  trial 


48  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

at  the  Old  Bailey  of  comparatively  recent  years 
in  The  Three  Clerks,  but  Trollope  rather  mars  the 
value  and  the  effect  of  it  by  confessing  that  he  had 
never  seen  the  place  he  is  describing  ;  moreover, 
we  have  loitered  too  long  about  this  scandalous 
old  Jail  that  has  been  tardily  converted  into  a 
simple  Sessions  House.  No  wonder  Besant's  William 
Halliday,  telling  of  how  in  his  younger  days  he 
married  gentle  little  Alice  Shirley,  as  poor  as  him- 
self, and  they  went  on  a  cheap  honeymoon-walk 
round  London,  wrote  of  it  like  this  :  "  From  St. 
Paul's  we  walked  up  the  narrow  street  called  the 
Old  Bailey  and  saw  the  outside  of  Newgate.  Now 
had  we  known  what  things  we  were  to  do  and  suffer 
in  that  awful  place,  I  think  we  should  have  prayed 
for  death." 

Were  we  concerned  for  London's  association  with 
persons  who  have  lived  in  the  flesh,  we  could  not 
pass  up  Newgate  Street  without  having  much  to 
say  of  Christ's  Hospital  which,  until  it  was  recently 
replaced  by  a  block  of  the  new  Post  Office,  rose  on 
our  left,  behind  its  railings,  scarce  altered  from  the 
days  when  it  numbered  Lamb,  and  Coleridge,  and 
Leigh  Hunt  among  its  scholars  ;  nor  without  more 
than  a  casual  glance  across  the  road  at  that  glamor- 
ous tavern,  "  The  Salutation  and  Cat,"  which  stands 
there  for  ever  to  the  lover  of  Lamb,  though  the  mere 
eye  may  no  longer  perceive  it,  with  Lamb  himself 
and  Coleridge  and  Hazlitt  for  ever  holding  session 
in  its  snug  parlour.  These  matters,  however,  are 
not  for  us  ;  but  we  will,  if  you  like,  go  a  little  way 
into  Warwick  Lane,  to  the  street  in  which  Probus, 
the  villainous  attorney  of  The  Orange  Girl — the  man 


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Shakesf>i-nrc  liad  the  warrant  of  HolinshecTs  Chronicle  for  inaking  Caiie  strike 
London  Stone  and  declare  himself  lord  of  the  City." 

Chapter  J 


"SARACEN'S  HEAD"  AND  NEWGATE    49 

who   was   mainly   responsible   for   landing    Halliday 
in  Newgate — had  his  offices  : 

"  Mr.  Probus  wrote  from  a  house  in  White  Hart  Street.  It 
is  a  small  street,  mostly  inhabited  by  poulterers,  which  leads 
from  Warwick  Lane  to  Newgate  Market :  a  confined  place 
at  best :  with  rows  of  birds  dangling  on  the  hooks^  not  always 
of  the  sweetest,  and  the  smell  of  the  meat  market  close  by 
and  the  proximity  of  the  shambles,  it  is  a  dark  and  noisome 
place.  The  house,  which  had  a  silver  Pen  for  its  sign,  was 
narrow,  and  of  three  stories  :  none  of  the  windows  had  been 
cleaned  for  a  long  time,  and  the  door  and  doorposts  wanted 
paint.  .  .  ,  The  door  was  opened  by  an  old  man  much  bent 
and  bowed  with  years  :  his  thin  legs,  his  thin  arms,  his  body — 
all  were  bent :  on  his  head  he  wore  a  small  scratch  wig  :  he 
covered  his  eyes  with  his  hand  on  account  of  the  blinding  light, 
yet  the  court  was  darkened  by  the  height  of  the  houses  above 
and  the  dangling  birds  below." 

There  are  no  dangling  birds  here  nowadays,  and 
no  poulterers'  shops  at  all ;  but  there  is  the  same 
narrow  street,  though  all  its  houses  are  changed, 
and  it  would  still  run  into  Newgate  Market,  only 
that  the  Market  has  given  place  to  Paternoster 
Square,  and  publishers  have  supplanted  the  butchers 
and  the  poulterers. 

Firk,  in  Dekker's  comedy,  The  Shoemaker's  Holi- 
day, remarks  that  "  a  mess  of  shoemakers  meet 
at  the  Woolsack  in  Ivy  Lane  " — here  is  Ivy  Lane, 
but  it  is  no  use  going  down,  for  the  Woolsack  has 
vanished  from  it.  Pass  the  Lane,  however,  and 
at  the  city  end  of  Newgate  Street  is  Panyer  Alley, 
leading  into  Paternoster  Row :  a  pinched  little 
lane  that  has  been  here  ever  since  the  fourteenth 
century    or    thereabouts.     Stow   speaks    of    it    as    a 


so  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

passage   out   of   Paternoster   Row,   "  called   of   such 
a  sign,   Panyar  Alley,   which  cometh   out  into  the 
north  over  against  St.  Martin's  Lane  "  (known  to  us 
as  St.  Martin's  le  Grand).     It  was  the  place  where 
panyers,  or  bread-baskets,  were  sold  when  the  bakers 
congregated    near    by    in    Bread    Street,    Cheapside. 
"If   I   could  meet   one   of  these  varlets   who  wear 
Pannier-aUey   on   their    backs,"   cries   Monopoly,   in 
Webster's    Westward    Ho !    "  1    would    make    them 
scud  so  fast  from  me  that  they  should  think  it  a 
shorter  way  between  this  and  Ludgate  than  a  con- 
demned  cutpurse   thinks   it   between   Newgate    and 
Tyburn  !  "     But  all  the  Alley  has  been  modernised 
except  the  sign  after  which  Stow  says  it  was  named  : 
this  you  shall  see  built  into  one  of  the  new  walls 
and  covered  with  glass.     It  is  a  crude  sculpture  of 
a  boy  seated  on  a  panyer,  is  dated  August  the  27th, 
1688  (whence  I  take  it  the  sign  must  have  been  re- 
stored and  redated,  for  Stow  wrote  nearly  a  century 
earlier),  and  proclaims  in  ancient  lettering  :    "  When 
you  have  sought  the  city  round,  yet  stiU  this  is  the 
highest    ground."     Niggling    sticklers    for    accuracy 
have    taken    measurements    and    insist    that    some 
part  of  Cornhill  rises  a  foot  higher,  but  I  am  not 
so   hungry    for   facts    as    all    that,   and  we  will  go 
on  our  way  with  an  easy  and  an  open  mind  on  the 
question. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE   POETRY   OF   CHEAPSIDE 

AT  the  top  of  Cheapside  a  blackened  statue  of 
Peel  stands  on  a  heavy  pedestal  and  gazes 
blandly  into  one  of  the  most  famous  streets  in  the 
world.  I  admire  the  good  Sir  Robert  and  like  him 
in  his  proper  place,  but  when  you  awake  to  all  the 
romance  that  glorifies  Cheapside  you  realise  that 
this  is  no  place  for  such  a  man  as  Peel.  There  is 
no  magic  about  him  ;  he  will  stare  along  the  street 
untU  he  crumbles  away  and  never  see  anything  but 
the  traffic  in  it  ;  he  is  as  strange  and  lost  among  its 
best  memories  as  Bottom  the  Weaver  was  in  fairy- 
land. It  should  have  been  some  great  dreamer  up 
there  on  the  pedestal,  not  a  party  politician  ;  it 
should  have  been  Shakespeare,  for  instance,  because 
of  his  association  with  the  "  Mermaid,"  which  stood 
in  Cheapside  between  Bread  Street  and  Friday 
Street,  and  carved  around  his  pedestal  should  have 
been  figures  of  Ben  Jonson,  Beaumont,  Fletcher, 
Donne,  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  and  others  of  that  im- 
mortal company  who  used  to  assemble  at  the  "  Mer- 
maid "  with  him.  Or  it  should  have  been  Dickens, 
for  all  London  belongs  to  him,  and  he  belongs  to  all 
London  ;  wherever  you  go  about  its  streets,  you 
can  never  get  away  from  him  and,  better  still,  you 
never  want  to. 

61 


52  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Up  the  first  turning  on  your  left,  Foster  Lane, 
is  "  the  very  narrow  street  somewhere  behind  the 
Post  Office "  (which  is  being  pulled  down  while  I 
write)  that  contained  the  business  premises  of 
Anthony  Chuzzlewit  and  Son,  Manchester  Ware- 
housemen. But  before  you  get  so  far  as  to  Foster 
Lane,  directly  you  turn  into  Cheapside,  you  will 
meet  Pip  again,  out  of  Great  Expectations.  Early 
one  afternoon,  he  tells  you,  "  I  had  strolled  up  into 
Cheapside,  and  was  strolling  along  it,  surely  the 
most  unsettled  person  in  all  the  busy  concourse, 
when  a  large  hand  was  laid  upon  my  shoulder,  by 
someone  overtaking  me.  It  was  Mr.  Jaggers's  hand, 
and  he  passed  it  through  my  arm.  '  As  we  are 
going  in  the  same  direction,  Pip,  we  may  walk  to- 
gether. Where  are  you  bound  for  ?  '  "  Pip  was 
in  doubt,  so  he  consented  to  dine  with  Mr.  J  aggers, 
"  and  we  went  along  Cheapside  and  slanted  off  to 
Little  Britain,"  this  end  of  which  lies  up  in  St. 
Martin's  le  Grand.  But  earlier  than  this,  when 
he  first  arrived  in  London,  Pip  came  by  the  coach 
to  the  Cross  Keys,  Wood  Street  ;  and,  also  before 
that  meeting  in  Cheapside  with  Mr.  J  aggers,  he  was 
round  here  in  Wood  Street  to  meet  the  coach  that 
was  to  bring  Estella  to  town  : 

"  If  there  had  been  time,  I  should  probably  have  ordered 
several  suits  of  clothes  for  this  occasion  ;  but  as  there  was 
not,  I  was  fain  to  be  content  with  those  I  had.  My  appetite 
vanished  instantly,  and  I  knew  no  peace  or  rest  until  the 
day  arrived.  Not  that  its  arrival  brought  me  either  ;  for  then 
I  was  worse  than  ever,  and  began  haunting  the  coach-office 
in  Wood  Street,  Cheapside,  before  the  coach  had  left  the  Blue 
Boar  in  our  town.    For  all  that  I  knew  this  perfectly  well,  I 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  53 

still  felt  as  if  it  were  not  safe  to  let  the  coach-office  be  out  of 
my  sight  longer  than  five  minutes  at  a  time  ;  and  in  this  con- 
dition of  unreason  I  had  performed  the  first  half-hour  of  a 
watch  of  four  or  five  hours,  when  Wemmick  ran  against  me. 

"  '  Hallo,  Mr.  Pip/  said  he, '  how  do  you  do  ?  I  should  hardly 
have  thought  this  was  yotir  beat.' 

"  I  explained  that  I  was  waiting  to  meet  somebody  who  was 
coming  up  by  coach,  and  I  inquired  after  the  Castle  and  the 
Aged." 

Finding  he  had  time  to  spare,  Wemmick  invited 
him  to  occupy  the  interval  by  going  with  him  to 
"  have  a  look  at  Newgate  ;  "  and  they  passed  out 
together  up  Cheapside  to  Newgate  Street  and  went 
through  the  Jail,  interviewing  those  prisoners  in 
whom  Mr.  J  aggers  was  interested.  Pip  escaped 
from  Wemmick  and  got  back  to  the  Cross  Keys  in 
Wood  Street,  still  "  with  some  three  hours  on  hand  ;  " 
but  at  last  the  coach  came,  and  he  saw  Estella's 
face  at  the  window  and  her  hand  waving  to  him. 

There  is  no  Cross  Keys  in  Wood  Street  now  ;  you 
may  learn  from  old  directories  that  it  was  six  doors 
beyond  the  corner  of  Goldsmith  Street  there,  and 
though  it  is  gone  and  commonplace  warehouses  cover 
its  site,  who  can  pass  the  spot  without  seeing  Pip 
hover  about  it  in  that  eager  impatience,  without 
seeing  Wemmick  come  upon  him  there,  without 
seeing  the  coach  drive  up  with  Estella's  face  at  the 
window  ?  And  I  remember  how  they  dined  together 
at  the  Inn  whilst  a  carriage  was  fetched  for  her. 

But  Wood  Street  swarms  with  other  memories, 
Donne  was  bom  in  it  ;  Shakespeare  lived  for  several 
years  at  the  corner  of  Silver  Street,  near  the 
northern  end  of  it.     And   in  Wood  Street  was  the 


54  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Compter,  one  of  the  city's  debtors'  prisons.  Tenter- 
hook, in  Webster's  Westward  Ho !  bids  his  servant, 
"  Bring  a  Hnk  and  meet  me  at  the  Counter  in  Wood 
Street  ;  "  and  Ben  Jonson  lays  a  scene  of  Every  Man 
Out  of  his  Humour  in  "  The  Counter,"  where  Fas- 
tidious Brisk  is  a  prisoner,  and  Fallace  goes  to  visit 
him,  sighing,  "  O,  master  Fastidious,  what  a  pity 
is  it  to  see  so  sweet  a  man  as  you  are  in  so  sour  a 
place  !  "  Also  in  Wood  Street  was  The  Mitre  tavern 
(there  is  still  a  queer  furtive  Mitre  Court  there,  nearly 
opposite  where  the  Cross  Keys  was)  in  which  Jonson 
places  two  scenes  of  that  same  play  of  his,  Puntar- 
volo,  recommending  it  as  a  rendezvous,  for  "  Your 
Mitre  is  your  best  house."  It  was  another  gathering 
place  of  the  wits,  as  you  glimpse  from  a  passage  in 
Bartholomew  Fair,  where  Littlewit  inveighs  against 
those  "  pretenders  to  wit,  your  Three  Cranes,  Mitre, 
and  Mermaid  men  !  not  a  corn  of  true  salt,  not 
a  grain  of  right  mustard  amongst  them  all.  They 
may  stand  for  places,  or  so,  again  the  next  witfall, 
and  pay  twopence  in  a  quart  more  for  their  canary 
than  other  men.  But  give  me  the  man  can  start  up 
a  justice  of  wit  out  of  six  shillings  beer,  and  give  the 
law  to  all  the  poets  and  poet-suckers  in  town  : — 
because  they  are  the  players  gossips !  "  Pepys 
knew  The  Mitre,  before  it  was  destroyed  in  the  Great 
Fire,  and  notes,  on  the  i8th  September  1660  :  "To 
the  Miter  taverne  in  Wood  Streete  (a  house  of  the 
greatest  note  in  London)."  On  the  31st  July  1665 
another  entry  in  his  Diary  tells  that  "  Proctor  the 
vintner  of  the  Miter  in  Wood  Street,  and  his  son, 
are  dead  this  morning  there,  of  the  plague  ;  he 
having   laid   out   abundance   of   money   there,   and 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  55 

was  the  greatest  vintner  for  some  time  in  London 
for  great  entertainments."  And  in  the  remnant 
of  an  old  churchyard  at  the  Cheapside  corner  of 
Wood  Street  still  survives  the  tree  that  reminds 
you  at  once  of  Wordsworth's  "  Reverie  of  Poor 
Susan  "  : 

At  the  corner  of  Wood  Street,  when  daylight  appears, 
There's  a  thrush  that  sings  loud— it  has  sung  for  three  years  : 
Poor  Susan  has  passed  by  the  spot,  and  has  heard 
In  the  silence  of  morning  the  song  of  the  bird, 

'Tis  a  note  of  enchantment ;  what  ails  her  ?    She  sees 
A  mountain  ascending,  a  vision  of  trees  ; 
Bright  volumes  of  vapour  through  Lothbury  glide. 
And  a  river  flows  on  through  the  vale  of  Cheapside.  .  .  . 

All  our  literature  is  thick-sown  with  references 
to  Cheapside.  If  you  go  back  to  the  beginning  of 
the  fifteenth  century,  when  it  was  Westcheap,  and 
already  a  famous  market-street,  you  have  Lydgate, 
in  his  London  Lackpenny,  telling  how  he  came  to 
town,  passed  through  Westminster,  and 

Then  to  the  Chepe  I  began  me  drawn, 
Where  much  people  I  saw  for  to  stand  : 
One  offered  me  velvet,  silk  and  lawn. 
Another  he  taketh  me  by  the  hand  : 
'  Here  is  Paris  thread,  the  finest  in  the  land.' 
I  never  was  used  to  such  things  indeed  ; 
And  wanting  money  I  might  not  speed. 

But  nowhere  is  London  more  freely  or  familiarly 
used  than  in  the  Elizabethan  plays  ;  it  has  never 
had  truer  or  heartier  lovers  than  the  old  Dramatists. 
Of   course,    their   London   was   a   more   picturesque 


56  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  a  smaller  place,  bounded,  roughly,  by  the 
Strand  on  the  west  and  Aldgate  on  the  east ;  by 
Southwark  on  the  south,  and  Clerkenwell,  Fins- 
bury,  Shoreditch,  towards  the  north ;  and  those  t 
who  lived  in  that  small,  comfortable  city  were  as  \ 
intimate  with  it  almost  as  a  man  is  with  his  native  ■ 
village,  hence  a  playwright  laid  his  scenes  in  its 
streets  and  inns,  made  casual  reference  by  name 
to  certain  of  its  eccentric  street-characters,  to  its 
highways  and  byways,  and  even  its  back  alleys,  in 
the  surety  that  most  of  his  audience  knew  those 
characters  and  the  special  characteristics  of  those 
streets  and  alleys  as  well  as  he  did  himself  and  would 
readily  take  the  significance  of  his  allusions.  Middle- 
ton  laid  the  principal  scenes  of  A  Chaste  Maid  in 
Cheapside  in  a  goldsmith's  shop  on  that  thorough- 
fare, and  between  Yellowhammer,  the  goldsmith, 
engaged  in  his  shop,  and  Maudlin,  his  wife,  and 
Moll,  his  daughter,  busied  about  the  house,  you 
have  vivid  little  sketches  of  the  commercial  and 
domestic  life  of  the  period  running  through  the 
rather  extravagant  plot  of  his  comedy.  As  an  illus- 
tration of  the  freedom  with  which  dramatists  then 
would  use  a  living  contemporary  :  Sims,  a  porter, 
comes  into  the  shop  with  "  a  letter  from  a  gentle- 
man in  Cambridge,"  and  Yellowhammer  exclaims, 
"  O,  one  of  Hobson's  porters  :  thou  art  welcome. 
— I  told  thee,  Maud,  we  should  hear  from  Tim." 
Tim,  their  son,  was  at  Cambridge,  as  imaginary  a 
person  as  Yellowhammer  himself ;  but  Hobson 
was  the  real  Cambridge  carrier  of  those  days.  He 
trafficked  between  Cambridge  and  London,  and  was 
as  well  known  in  the  one  city  as  the  other.     Plutus, 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  57 

in  Randolph's  Hey,  for  Honesty,  reciting  his  pedigree 
says,  "  I  am  Plutus,  the  rich  god  of  wealth  :  my 
•father  was  Pinchbeck  Truepenny,  the  rich  usurer 
of  Ishngton ;  my  mother.  Mistress  Silverside,  an 
alderman's  widow.  I  was  born  in  Golden  Lane, 
christened  at  the  Mint  in  the  Tower ;  Banks  the 
conjuror  and  old  Hobson  the  carrier  were  my  god- 
fathers." Hobson  was  something  of  an  eccentric  ; 
he  would  let  horses  out  on  hire,  but  instead  of  per- 
mitting his  customers  to  choose  the  one  each  pre- 
ferred, he  insisted  on  the  horses  going  out  in  rotation, 
and  so  has  become  immortalised  in  the  proverb 
"  Hobson's  choice."  More  than  that  when  this 
most  glorious  of  carriers  died  a  generation  later  no 
less  a  poet  than  Milton,  then  a  young  man  at  Cam- 
bridge, wrote  two  epitaphs.  On  the  University  Carrier, 
Who  sickened  in  the  time  of  his  vacancy  ;  being  forbid 
to  go  to  London,  by  reason  of  the  Plague  : 

Here  lies  old  Hobson  ;  death  hath  broke  his  girt, 
And  here,  alas  !  hath  laid  him  in  the  dirt.  .  .  . 
'Twas  such  a  shifter  that,  if  truth  were  known, 
Death  was  half  glad  when  he  had  got  him  down  ; 
For  he  had,  any  time  this  ten  years  full. 
Dodged  with  him  betwixt  Cambridge  and  The  Btdl.  .  .  . 
Rest,  that  gives  all  men  life,  gave  him  his  death, 
And  too  much  breathing  put  him  out  of  breath. 

Which  is  curiously  reminiscent  of  that  later  Cheap- 
side  poet,  Thomas  Hood :  he  was  born  in  the 
Poultry,  and  Milton  in  Bread  Street,  where  a  bust 
and  an  inscription  commemorate  his  birthplace. 
And  whilst  we  are  touching  on  this  aspect  of  Cheap- 
side,  one  may  add  that  Herrick  was  born  above  his 
father's  shop  there  ;    that  Keats  lodged  for  a  while 


58  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

in  rooms  over  Bird-in-Hand  Court,  and  Coryat,  the 
odd  author  of  the  Crudities,  used  to  live  in  Bow 
Lane. 

We  are  not  yet  finished,  though,  with  the  familiar 
way  in  which  this  real  thoroughfare  runs  through 
the  fictions  of  dramatists  and  novelists.  Susan,  the 
lady  love  of  Ralph,  in  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's 
Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestle,  was  "  a  cobler's  maid 
in  Milk  Street."  Young  Chartley,  in  Hey  wood's 
Wise  Woman  of  Hogsdon  (now  corrupted  into 
Hoxton),  remarks  on  the  "  brave  things  to  be  bought 
in  the  city ;  Cheapside  and  the  Exchange  afford 
variety  and  rarity  ;  "  and  presently  his  father,  old 
Chartley,  newly  arrived  in  London,  ejaculates. 

Good  Heaven  !  this  London  is  a  stranger  grown, 
And  out  of  my  acquaintance  ;  this  seven  years 
I  have  not  seen  Paul's  steeple,  or  Cheap  Cross. 

The  steeple,  of  course,  went  down  in  the  Great  Fire, 
and  Wren  rebuilt  the  Cathedral  with  a  dome  ;  and 
as  for  the  Cross,  which  stood  midway  along  Cheap- 
side  to  mark  where  Queen  Elinor's  cofiin  had  rested 
on  its  way  to  burial  at  Westminster,  the  Puritans 
objected  to  the  figure  of  the  Virgin  that  was  sculp- 
tured on  it  and  it  was  removed  in  1643.  "  Let  your 
gifts  be  slight  and  dainty,  rather  than  precious," 
urges  Truewit,  of  Ben  Jonson's  Silent  Woman.  "  Let 
cunning  be  above  cost.  Give  cherries  at  time 
of  year,  or  apricots  ;  and  say  they  were  sent 
you  out  of  the  country,  though  you  bought  them 
in  Cheapside  ;  "  and  Littlewit,  admiring  his  wife's 
new  dress,  in  Bartholomew  Fair,  challenges  "  all 
Cheapside    to    show    such    another,"      "  Men    and 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  59 

women  are  bom,"  cries  Justiniano,  in  Webster's 
Westward  Ho  !  "  and  come  running  into  the  world 
faster  than  coaches  do  into  Cheapside  upon  Simon's 
or  Jude's  day." 

But  one  might  go  on  in  this  fashion  almost  end- 
lessly, and  you  could  gather  from  these  old  plaj's  a 
full  and  intimate  acquaintance  with  the  peculiar 
characteristics  of  Cheapside  and  the  life  that  went 
on  in  it  then.  There  is  talk  enough  in  them  of  the 
Mermaid  alone  to  fill  a  chapter.  It  stood  between 
Friday  and  Bread  Streets,  with  side  entrances  in  each. 
Ben  Jonson,  in  the  poem  on  his  celebrated  voyage 
through  the  London  sewer,  sings  of  "  the  brave 
adventure  of  two  wights,"  who 

At  Bread  Street's  Mermaid  having  dined,  and  merry, 
Proposed  to  go  to  Holborn  in  a  wherry  ; 

and  he  shows  you  Meercraft,  in  The  Devil  is  an  Ass, 
reproving  the  impoverished  Everill  with. 

Why,  I  have  told  you  this.     This  comes  of  wearing 
Scarlet,  gold  lace,  and  cut-works  !  your  fine  gartering. 
With  your  blown  roses,  cousin  !  and  your  eating 
Pheasant,  and  godwit,  here  in  London,  haunting 
The  Globes  and  Mermaids,  wedging  in  with  lords 
Still  at  the  table.  .  .  . 

There  is  a  London  street  scene  in  Beaumont  and 
Fletcher's  Wit  Without  Money,  where  Valentine 
meets  Francisco  and  Lance  :  they  try  to  borrow  a 
hundred  pounds  from  him,  but  he  is  too  broken 
himself  to  lend  them  more  than  five  shillings,  and 
to  their  plea  as  to  how  they  are  to  get  money,  he 
airily  advises  them  to  take  to  writing  news,  or  better 
stiU: 


60  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Cosmography 
Thou'rt  deeply  read  in  ;  draw  me  a  map  from  the  Mermaid, 
I  mean  a  midnight  map,  to  'scape  the  watches. 
And  such  long,  senseless  examinations, 
And  gentlemen  shall  feed  thee,  right  good  gentlemen. 

Cheapside  has  rung  with  the  midnight  noises  of  such 
roistering  gentlemen,  coming  late  from  the  vanished 
tavern  in  no  good  state  to  find  their  way  home,  and 
anxious  to  go  by  quiet  ways  where  there  was  no 
danger  of  running  into  any  officious  Dogberrys. 
Valentine  ends  the  interview  and  gets  rid  of  his 
importunate  friends  with  a  hasty,  parting  invitation  : 

Meet  me  at  the  Mermaid, 
And  thou  shalt  see  what  things 

Which  has  a  pleasant  echo  in  it  of  Beaumont's  rap- 
turous and  famous  letter  from  the  country  to  Ben 
Jonson — 

What  things  have  we  seen 
Done  at  the  Mermaid  !  heard  words  that  have  been 
So  nimble  and  so  full  of  subtile  flame 
As  if  that  every  one  from  whence  they  came 
Had  meant  to  put  his  whole  wit  in  a  jest, 
And  had  resolved  to  live  a  fool  the  rest 
Of  his  dull  life.  .  .  . 

Up  King  Street  is  the  Guildhall,  which  plays  a 
part  in  so  many  plays  from  Shakespeare's  time  to 
Tennyson's  ;  but  before  we  come  to  King  Street,  there 
is  Bow  Church,  whose  bells  rang  in  the  ears  of  Dick 
Whittington,  out  on  Highgate  Hill,  and  called  him 
back  to  be  thrice  Lord  Mayor  of  London. 

I'll  get  a  high-crowned  hat  with  five  low  bells 
To  make  a  peal  shall  serve  as  well  as  Bow, 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  61 

says  Microprepes,  in  Randolph's  Muses'  Looking- 
Glass,  when,  as  churchwarden  of  his  parish  he  is 
arranging  to  put  a  steeple  on  their  church  ;  and 
that  faithful  cockney  of  yesterday,  Henry  S.  Leigh, 
shows  how  remembering  the  sound  of  Bow  Bells 
when  he  is  far  from  them  will  make  the  true-born 
Londoner  home-sick  : 

I  am  partial  to  trees  as  a  rule  ; 

And  the  rose  is  a  beautiful  flower. 
(Yes,  I  once  read  a  ballad  at  school 

Of  a  rose  that  was  washed  in  a  shower.) 
But  although  I  may  dote  on  the  rose, 

I  can  scarcely  beheve  that  it  smells 
Quite  so  sweet  in  the  bed  where  it  grows 

As  when  sold  within  sound  of  Bow  Bells. 

If  the  unimagined  history  of  the  city  were  not 
rather  outside  our  scope,  how  much  we  should  have 
to  say  of  stirring  episodes  in  the  life  of  London 
that  have  happened  in  and  around  Bow  Church  ; 
of  offenders  who  have  been  burned  and  hanged 
in  the  open  street  hereabouts  ;  of  the  stately  pro- 
cessions of  Kings,  Queens,  and  especially  of  Lord 
Mayors  that  have  glittered  up  Cheapsidc  and  round 
to  the  Guildhall  !  But  to-day  we  will  go  up  King 
Street  with  that  small  boy  in  Dickens's  delightful 
short  story.  Gone  Astray.  He  was  a  small  boy  who 
had  evaded  his  nurse  and  was  bent,  among  other 
things,  on  finding  his  way  to  Guildhall  and  seeing 
Gog  and  Magog  : 

"  I  found  it  a  long  journey  to  the  Giants  and  a  slow  one. 
I  came  into  the  presence  at  last,  and  gazed  up  at  them  with 
dread  anrl  veneration.  They  looked  better-tempered  and  were 
altogether  more  shiny-faced  than  I  had  expected  ;    but  they 


62  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

were  very  big  and,  as  I  judged  their  pedestals  to  be  about 
forty  feet  high,  I  considered  that  they  would  be  very  big  indeed 
if  they  were  walking  on  the  stone  pavement.  I  was  in  a  state 
of  mind  as  to  these  and  all  such  figures  which  I  suppose  holds  i 
equally  with  most  children.  While  I  knew  them  to  be  images 
made  of  something  that  was  not  fiesh  and  blood,  I  still  invested 
them  with  attributes  of  life — with  consciousness  of  my  being 
there,  for  example,  and  the  power  of  keeping  a  sly  eye  upon 
me.  Being  very  tired  I  got  into  the  corner  under  Magog,  to 
be  out  of  the  way  of  his  eye,  and  fell  asleep.  When  I  started 
up  after  a  long  nap,  I  thought  the  Giants  were  roaring,  but  it 
was  only  the  City." 

He  goes  on  to  relate  how,  feeling  very  hungry,  he 
went  out  and  bought  a  roll  and  a  German  sausage, 
and  took  them  back  and  ate  them  in  the  Guildhall, 
a  friendly  stray  dog  who  had  followed  him  fawning 
round  and  begging  for  the  scraps.  Then  after  cry- 
ing a  little  from  very  loneliness,  he  set  forth  and  made 
his  way  to  Cheapside  again,  and  so  on  to  the  Royal 
Exchange.  I  am  not  going  to  describe  Guildhall  : 
you  may  go  and  see  it,  with  the  Giants  in  it  still. 
But  we  have  other  things  to  detain  us  yet  in  Cheap- 
side.  Here,  for  one,  is  Bucklersbury — the  very  name 
redolent  of  half  a  dozen  bits  in  the  Elizabethan 
dramas,  though  the  lane  is  no  longer  given  over, 
as  it  was  in  Shakespeare's  time,  to  grocers  and 
druggists  whose  simples  and  spices  made  it  a  place 
of  mingled  fragrances,  especially  in  the  Spring  of 
the  year.  "  Go  into  Bucklersbury,"  Mistress  Tenter- 
hook orders  her  cashier  in  Westward  Ho !  "  and 
fetch  me  two  ounces  of  preserved  melons  :  look 
there  be  no  tobacco  taken  in  the  shop  when  he  weighs 
it ;  "  and  in  the  same  play  you  have  Mistress  Wafer 
hurriedly  dispatching  a  boy — "  Run  into  Bucklers- 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  63 

bury  for  two  ounces  of  dragon-water,  some  sper- 
maceti, and  treacle."  And  we  are  here  again  in 
Falstaff's  footsteps,  for  you  remember  his  lusty 
appeal  to  Mistress  Ford  :  "  "WTiat  made  me  love 
thee  ?  let  that  persuade  thee  there's  something 
extraordinary  in  thee.  Come,  I  cannot  cog  and 
say  thou  art  this  and  that,  like  a  many  of  these 
lisping  hawthorn  buds,  that  come  like  women  in 
men's  apparel,  and  smell  like  Bucklersbury  in 
simple-time  ;    I  cannot  ;  but  I  love  thee." 

There  is  no  street  out  of  Cheapside,  however,  that 
has  such  peculiar  attractions  for  me  as  Old  Jewry. 
Not  because  the  Jews  had  a  settlement  here  in 
the  time  of  William  the  Conqueror ;  nor  because 
Lord  Beaoonsfield  was  articled  to  a  solicitor  here 
in  Frederick's  Place  ;  nor  because  that  mysterious 
person  in  Gissing's  Town  Traveller,  the  Lord  Pol- 
perro,  who  masqueraded  as  Mr.  Clover  and  kept  a 
china  shop,  came  to  consult  his  solicitor,  Cuthbertson, 
at  Old  Jewry  Chambers,  a  gloomy,  blind  square  of 
a  place  on  the  right  of  the  street ;  but  because  Ben 
Jonson  laid  in  Old  Jewry  some  of  the  chief  scenes 
of  his  Every  Man  in  His  Humour.  I  first  read 
Jonson  when  I  was  barely  twenty,  when  my  business 
affairs  took  mc  round  by  Old  Jewry  almost  every 
day,  and  for  me  the  street  has  ever  since  worn  the 
atmosphere  that  he  gives  it  in  his  play. 

Except  for  a  house  or  two  in  Frederick's  Place, 
and  the  back  of  a  church,  there  is  nothing  in  Old 
Jewry  nowadays  that  can  pretend  to  anything  like 
antiquity  ;  it  is  as  staid  and  ordinary  a  thorough- 
fare as  you  will  fmd  anywhere  in  London.  But 
at  the  Cheapside  end,  on  the  right,  is  Dove  Court, 


64  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  I  am  persuaded  that  such  a  Court  was  there 
when  Ben  Jonson  was  writing  ;  it  retains  its  original 
shape,  and  even  in  rebuilding  it  the  builders  have  ! 
been  unable  to  get  rid  of  its  quaint,  snug  character. 
We  have  lost  the  gift  of  building  such  queer,  pic- 
turesque bjAvays  ;  they  belong  to  an  age  that  was 
simpler,  gave  freer  play  to  its  idiosyncrasies,  was 
less  severely  practical  than  ours  ;  but  you  cannot 
walk  into  Dove  Court  to-day,  any  more  than  you 
can  walk  into  that  odd  Mitre  Court  in  Wood  Street, 
without  feeling  that  you  have  strayed  back  into  the 
Elizabethan  era.  And  next  door  to  Dove  Court 
is  a  modem  tavern,  but  nothing  will  ever  persuade 
me  it  is  not  the  lineal  descendant  of  that  Windmill 
Tavern  which  figures  in  Every  Man  in  His  Humour. 
You  find  it  as  the  first  scene  of  Act  3  :  "  The  Old 
Jewry.  A  room  in  the  Windmill  Tavern ;  "  and 
into  it  come  Master  Mathew,  the  town  gull.  Well- 
bred,  the  half-brother  of  Squire  Downright,  and 
the  inimitable  Captain  Bobadil.  continuing  a  con- 
versation : 

Mat.  Yes,  faith,  sir,  we  were  at  your  lodging  to  seek  you. 

Wei.  Oh,  I  came  not  there  to-night. 

Bob.  Your  brother  delivered  us  as  much. 

Wei.  Who,  my  brother  Downright  ? 

Bob.  He.  Mr.  Wellbred,  I  know  not  in  what  kind  you  hold 
me  ;  but  let  me  say  to  you  this  :  as  sure  as  honour,  I  esteem 
it  so  much  out  of  the  sunshine  of  reputation,  to  throw  the 
least  beam  of  regard  upon  such  a 

Wei.  Sir,  I  must  hear  no  ill  words  of  my  brother. 

Bob.  I  protest  to  you,  as  I  have  a  thing  to  be  saved  about 
me,  I  never  saw  any  gentleman-like  part 

Wei.  Well,  good  Captain,  faces  about  to  some  other  discourse. 

Bob.  With  your  leave,  sir,  an  there  were  no  more  men  living 


'A; 


P^JSAD/SS  SrJ2£6T 
fte.d'^yidcoalc  ■ 

vki  Ack-yovd,  0/  Cissinc's  '  Thytzn,'  lived  in  f'areuiisf  Striit.     lioTVcr  s  sliofi, 
<o.  a  smnll gintral s/t<>/>,  vns  in  I'niidisf  Street,  close  l>y  tlu-  railwav  arch.' 


Chapters 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  65 

upon  the  face  of  the  earthy  I  should  not  fancy  him,  by  St. 
George  ! 

Mat.  Troth,  nor  I ;  he  is  of  a  rustical  cut,  I  know  not  how  : 
he  doth  not  carry  himself  like  a  gentleman  of  fashion. 

Wei.  Oh,  Master  Mathew,  that's  a  grace  peculiar  but  to  a 
few,  quos  cequus  amavit  Jupiter. 

Mat.  I  understand  you,  sir. 

Wei.  No  question,  you  do — or  you  do  not,  sir. 

At  which  juncture  arrive  Edward  Knowell  and 
Master  Stephen ;  Knowell  incensed  that  Wellbred 
has  sent  him  a  compromising  letter  which  the  mes- 
senger delivered  into  the  hands  of  his  father,  who 
opened  it ;  and  presently  they  are  joined  in  this 
same  glorious  tavern  by  Brainworm,  the  servant 
of  Knowell  senior :  he  comes  disguised  to  warn 
Edward  that  his  father  is  in  pursuit  of  him  and  is 
now  "  at  Justice  Clement's  house  in  Coleman  Street, 
where  he  but  stays  my  return."  Wellbred  lodges 
at  the  house  of  the  merchant  Kitely,  also  in  Old 
Jewry,  but  had  dated  his  letter  to  Edward  Knowell 
from  The  Windmill,  where  another  scene  is  placed 
later  in  the  comedy.  One  scene,  between  the  elder 
Knowell  and  Formal,  the  justice's  clerk,  takes  place 
in  the  open  street  of  Old  Jewry  ;  and  several  scenes 
are  laid  in  "  The  Old  Jewry.  A  Hall  in  Kitely's 
house,"  in  the  first  of  which  you  sec  something  of 
the  merchant's  business.  Downright  has  just  called, 
but  before  settling  to  talk  with  him,  Kitely  finishes 
giving  instructions  to  his  clerk.  Cash  : 

Kit.  Thomas,  come  hither. 
There  lies  a  note  within  upon  my  desk  ; 
Here,  take  my  key  :   it  is  no  matter  neither. — 
Where's  the  boy  ? 


66  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Cash.  Within,  sir,  in  the  warehouse. 

Kit.  Let  him  tell  over  straight  that  Spanish  gold, 
And  weigh  it,  with  the  pieces  of  eight.     Do  you 
See  the  delivery  of  those  silver  stuffs 
To  Master  Lucar  :   tell  him,  if  he  will. 
He  shall  have  the  grograns  at  the  rate  I  told  him, 
And  I  will  meet  him  on  the  Exchange  anon. 

After  Cash  is  gone,  he  explains  to  Downright  that 
he  is  an  excellent  clerk  ;  years  ago  he  had  been  left  a 
foundling  at  his  door,  and  he  had  been  at  the  charge 
of  breeding  him  up.  From  which  they  pass  to  talk 
of  Downright's  half-brother  Wellbred  and  how  he 
has  fallen  into  evil  and  ruinously  extravagant  habits, 
till  they  are  interrupted  by  the  bell  ringing  for  break- 
fast, which  intimates  that  our  citizens  began  th^ir 
day's  work  several  hours  earlier  than  they  do  in  this 
century. 

Everything  in  the  play  happens  in  Old  Jewry  and 
within  a  mile  or  so  north  of  it.  You  have  scenes 
in  "  Coleman  Street.  A  room  in  Justice  Clement's 
house."  Well,  Coleman  Street  is  a  continuation  of 
Old  Jewry,  separated  from  it  by  Gresham  Street  ; 
and  you  have  scenes  in  Moorfields,  the  locality  of  which 
may  be  traced  by  the  street  of  that  name  which  is  a 
continuation  of  Coleman  Street,  separated  from  it  only 
by  Fore  Street  ;  and  Moorfields  used  to  stretch  away 
across  the  City  Road  to  Hoxton  (otherwise  Hogsden), 
where  old  Knowell  had  his  residence,  and  you  have  a 
scene  in  his  house,  whence  Edward  and  Stephen  set 
forth  to  that  meeting  at  The  Windmill.  Somewhere 
on  the  city  side  of  Moorfields  was  a  lane  leading  to 
the  shabby  home  of  Cob,  the  water-carrier,  in  one  of 
whose  rooms  the  boastful  Captain  Bobadil  has  his 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  6T 

lodging,  "  very  neat  and  private."  There  is  a  scene 
in  the  lane  when  the  prying  Master  Mathew  noses 
out  the  lodging  that  Bobadil  keeps  secret  and  is 
amazed  that  a  man  of  his  pretensions  should  "  lie  at 
a  water-bearer's  house  !  a  gentleman  of  his  havings  !  " 
and  a  greater  scene  inside  the  house  when  Master 
Mathew  intrudes  upon  the  privacy  of  the  Captain, 
who  carries  off  his  humiliation  with  a  grand  air. 
Cob,  commenting  on  the  situation  after  the  visitor 
has  gone  upstairs,  observes,  "  You  should  have  some 
now  would  take  this  Master  Mathew  to  be  a  gentle- 
man, at  the  least.  His  father's  an  honest  man,  a 
worshipful  fishmonger,  and  so  forth  ;  and  now  does 
he  creep  and  wriggle  into  acquaintance  with  all  the 
brave  gallants  about  the  town,  such  as  my  guest  is 
(O,  my  guest  is  a  fine  man  !),  and  they  flout  him  in- 
vincibly. He  useth  every  day  to  a  merchant's  house 
where  I  serve  water,  one  Master  Kitely,  in  the  Old 
Jewry  ;  and  here's  the  jest,  he  is  in  love  with  my 
master's  sister,  Mrs.  Bridget,  and  calls  her  mistress  ; 
and  there  he  will  sit  you  a  whole  afternoon  sometimes, 
reading  of  these  same  abominable,  vile,  rascally  verses, 
poetrie,  poetrie,  and  speaking  of  interludes  ;  'twill 
make  a  man  burst  to  hear  him.  And  the  wenches, 
they  do  so  jeer  and  ti-he  at  him  !  " 

So,  here  comes  Cob  every  morning  into  the  city, 
along  Coleman  Street,  past  Justice  Clement's  house, 
bringing  the  day's  water-supply  to  Master  Kitely's 
house  in  the  Old  Jewry  :  he  walks  in  at  that  scene 
from  which  I  have  quoted  and  arriving  just  after  the 
breakfast  bell  has  rung  is  reproved  by  Kitely  for 
"  coming  so  late  this  morning."  How  it  brings  the 
everyday  life  of  the  time  back  to  you  ;  the  merchant's 


68  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

business  going  on  all  the  while  from  soon  after  day- 
break, and  the  love-sick  Master  Mathew  making  his 
call  in  the  afternoons  to  sit  in  one  of  the  rooms  over 
the  warehouse  and  read  poetry  to  Mistress  Bridget 
and  be  laughed  at  by  the  maids.  This  is  the  real  life 
of  Old  Jewry,  for  it  never  dies  ;  I  know  all  these  people 
better  than  I  know  the  living  strangers  passing  to 
and  fro  in  the  street,  and  here,  near  by  Old  Jewry 
Chambers,  where  Gissing's  lawyer,  Cuthbertson,  had 
his  office,  Kitely's  house  used  to  stand,  on  the  site 
that  is  now  taken  up  by  a  huge,  handsome  modern 
building.  I  feel  that  this  is  where  it  stood,  and  who 
shall  confute  me  ?  Once,  when  I  was  early  in  the 
city,  I  even  went  out  of  my  way  to  walk  along  Old 
Jewry  before  seven  in  the  morning,  so  that  I  might 
be  passing  at  the  hour  when  Cob  came  toiling  across 
from  Coleman  Street  with  his  water-supply. 

Cheapside  was  always  a  notable  shopping  centre  ; 
latterly  it  caters  mainly  for  masculine  needs,  but 
aforetime  the  ladies  came  shopping  here  as  now  they 
go  to  Regent  Street.  It  was  quieter,  then,  of  course  ; 
there  was  far  less  traffic  in  the  roads  and  on  the  foot- 
ways ;  otherwise  it  would  not  have  been  considered 
a  convenient  place  for  public  executions.  Stow  tells 
us  of  many  such  ;  among  others  he  says  that  in  135 1 
"  two  fishmongers  were  beheaded  at  the  standard  in 
Chepe,  but  I  read  not  of  their  offence  ;  1381,  Wat 
Tyler  beheaded  Richard  Lions  and  other  there.  In 
the  year  1339,  Henry  IV.  caused  the  blanck  charters 
made  by  Richard  II.  to  be  burnt  there.  In  the  year 
1450  Jack  Cade,  captain  of  the  Kentish  rebels,  be- 
headed the  Lord  Say  there.  In  the  year  1461,  John 
Davy  had  his  hand  stricken  off  there,  because  he  had 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  69 

stricken  a  man  before  the  judges  at  Westminster." 
Pepys  was  a  frequenter  of  Cheapside  and  records  that 
a  little  gibbet  was  set  up  in  the  middle  of  the  street 
with  a  picture  of  Hewson,  the  regicide,  hung  upon  it, 
Hewson  himself  having  safely  escaped  to  Amsterdam 
on  the  Restoration  ;  and  he  relates  how,  in  1664, 
"  some  'prentices  being  put  in  the  pillory  to-day  for 
beating  of  their  masters  or  such  like  thing,  in  Cheap- 
side,  a  company  of  'prentices  come  and  rescued  them 
and  pulled  down  the  pillory  ;  and  they  being  set  up 
again,  did  the  like  again."  It  mitigates  the  present 
commercial  severity  of  the  place  to  recall  these  things, 
but  they  do  not  properly  concern  us,  and  we  will 
return  to  our  imaginary  folk. 

We  have  reached  that  part  of  Cheapside  which  has  a 
place  in  Barnahy  Rudge,  where  you  read  of  the  troops 
being  called  out  and  coming  into  conflict  with  the 
mob  :  "  The  firing  began  in  the  Poultry,  where  the 
chain  was  drawn  across  the  road,  where  nearly  a  score 
of  people  were  killed  on  the  first  discharge.  Their 
bodies  having  been  hastily  carried  into  St.  Mildred's 
church  by  the  soldiers,  they  fired  again,  and  following 
fast  upon  the  crowd,  who  began  to  give  way  when 
they  saw  the  execution  that  was  done,  formed  across 
Cheapside,  and  charged  them  at  the  point  of  the 
bayonet." 

The  riots  and  the  soldiers  were  real,  you  may  say, 
but  Mr.  Harcdalc,  who  belongs  to  the  same  novel, 
was  not,  and  a  little  before  this  happened  in  the 
Poultry  he  had  come  riding  in  from  the  other  side  of 
the  riotous  city  :  he  had  captured  Barnaby's  father 
and  was  bringing  him  with  him,  bent  on  handing  him 
over  to  justice  and  charging  him  with  the  murder 


70  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

he  had  committed  eight-and-twenty  years  earlier. 
He  was  warned  on  the  road  that  he  would  find  it 
difficult  in  the  disturbed  state  of  the  city  to  induce 
any  magistrate  to  commit  his  prisoner  to  jail  on  such 
a  complaint. 

"  But  notwithstanding  these  discouraging  accounts,  they 
went  on  and  reached  the  Mansion  House  soon  after  sunrise. 
Mr.  Haredale  threw  himself  from  his  horse,  but  he  had  no  need 
to  knock  at  the  door,  for  it  was  already  open,  and  there  stood 
upon  the  step  a  portly  old  man  with  a  very  red,  or  rather 
purple  face,  who,  with  an  anxious  expression  of  countenance, 
was  remonstrating  with  some  unseen  person  upstairs,  while 
the  porter  essayed  to  close  the  door  by  degrees  and  get  rid  of 
him.  With  the  intense  impatience  and  excitement  natural 
to  one  in  his  condition,  Mr.  Haredale  thrust  himself  forward 
and  was  about  to  speak,  when  the  fat  old  gentleman  interposed  : 

"  '  My  good  sir,'  said  he, '  pray  let  me  get  an  answer.  This  is 
the  sixth  time  I  have  been  here.  I  was  here  five  times  yesterday. 
My  house  is  threatened  with  destruction.  It  is  to  be  burned 
down  tonight,  and  was  to  have  been  last  night,  but  they  had 
other  business  on  their  hands.     Pray  let  me  get  an  answer.'  " 

The  old  gentleman  was  a  vintner  from  Holbom 
Hill,  and  as  the  Lord  Mayor,  trembling  within,  was 
too  terrified  of  the  Gordon  rioters  to  do  anything 
either  for  him  or  Mr.  Haredale,  they  rode  off  together 
and  appealed  more  successfully  to  Sir  John  Fielding, 
the  doughty,  blind  magistrate  of  Bow  Street. 

And  Cheapside  has  its  fair  share  of  homelier  fictitious 
happenings,  such  as  this  in  Beaconsfield's  Tancred, 
v/hen  Tancred  is  driving  on  his  first  visit  into  the 
city: 

"  It  was  just  where  the  street  is  most  crowded,  where  it 
narrows,  and  losing  the  name  of  Cheapside,  takes  that  of  the 
Poultry,  that  the  last  of  a  series  of  stoppages  occurred  ;    a 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  71 

stoppage  which,  at  the  end  of  ten  minutes,  lost  its  inert  character 
of  mere  obstruction,  and  developed  into  the  livelier  qualities 
of  the  row.  There  were  oaths,  contradictions,  menaces : 
'  No,  you  shan't ;  Yes,  I  will ;  No,  I  didn't ;  Yes,  you  did  ; 
No,  you  haven't ;  Yes,  you  have  ; '  the  lashing  of  a  whip, 
the  interference  of  a  policeman,  a  crash,  a  scream.  Tancred 
looked  out  of  the  window  of  his  brougham.  He  saw  a  chariot 
in  distress,  a  chariot  such  as  would  have  become  an  Ondine 
by  the  waters  of  the  Serpentine,  and  the  very  last  sort  of 
equipage  that  you  could  expect  to  see  smashed  in  the  Poultry. 
It  was  really  breaking  a  butterfly  upon  a  wheel ;  to  crush 
its  delicate  springs,  and  crack  its  dark  brown  panels,  soil  its 
dainty  hammer-cloth,  and  endanger  the  lives  of  its  young 
coachman  in  a  flaxen  wig,  and  its  two  tall  footmen  in  short 
coats,  worthy  of  Cinderella.  The  scream,  too,  came  from  a 
fair  owner,  who  was  surrounded  by  clamorous  carmen  and 
city  marshals,  and  who,  in  an  unknown  land,  was  afraid  she 
might  be  put  in  a  city  Compter,  because  the  people  in  the  city 
had  destroyed  her  beautiful  chariot.  Tancred  let  himself 
out  of  his  brougham,  and  not  without  difficulty  contrived, 
through  the  narrow  and  crowded  passage  formed  by  the  two 
lines,  to  reach  the  chariot,  which  was  coming  the  contrary 
way  to  him.  Some  ruthless  officials  were  persuading  a  beautiful 
woman  to  leave  her  carriage,  the  wheel  of  which  was  broken.  .  .  . 

"  '  What  am  I  to  do  ! '  exclaimed  the  lady,  with  a  tearful 
eye  and  agitated  face. 

"  '  I  have  a  carriage  at  hand,'  said  Tancred,  who  at  this 
moment  reached  her,  '  and  it  is  quite  at  your  service.' 

"  The  lady  cast  her  beautiful  eyes,  with  an  expression  of 
astonishment  she  could  not  conceal,  at  the  distinguished  youth 
who  thus  suddenly  appeared  in  the  midst  of  insolent  carmen, 
brutal  policemen,  and  all  the  cynical  amateurs  of  a  mob. 
Public  opinion  in  the  Poultry  was  against  her  ;  her  coachman's 
wig  had  excited  derision  ;  the  footmen  had  given  themselves 
airs  ;  there  was  a  strong  feeling  against  the  shorlcoats.  As  for 
the  lady,  though  at  first  awed  by  her  beauty  and  magnificence, 
they  rebelled  against  the  authority  of  her  manner.  Besides, 
she  was  not  alone.    There  was  a  gentleman  with  her,  who  wore 


72  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

moustaches,  and  had  taken  a  part  in  the  proceedings  at  first 
by  addressing  the  carmen  in  French. 

"  '  You  are  too  good,'  said  the  lady,  with  a  sweet  expression. 

"  Tancred  opened  the  door  of  the  chariot,  the  policemen 
pulled  down  the  steps,  the  servants  were  told  to  do  the  best 
they  could  with  the  wrecked  equipage  ;  in  a  second,  the  lady 
and  her  companion  were  in  Tancred's  brougham,  who,  desiring 
his  servants  to  obey  all  their  orders,  disappeared,  for  the 
stoppage  at  this  moment  began  to  move,  and  there  was  no  time 
for  bandying  compliments. 

"  He  had  gained  the  pavement,  and  had  made  his  way  as  far 
as  the  Mansion  House,  when,  finding  a  group  of  public  buildings, 
he  thought  it  prudent  to  enquire  which  was  the  Bank." 

It  was  pointed  out  to  him,  and  near  it  he  came  to 
Sequins  Court,  in  which  were  the  offices  of  the  great 
financier,  Sidonia,  whom  he  was  on  his  way  to  see. 

John  Calvert  Burley,  Besant's  heir  to  many  millions, 
in  Beyond  the  Dreams  of  Avarice,  was  last  seen  here- 
abouts before  his  complete  and  mysterious  vanishing. 
An  old  schoolfellow  wrote  to  those  who  were  seeking 
him  "  that  he  had  met  John  Calvert  Burley,  looking 
prosperous,  in  or  about  the  year  1870,  in  Cheapside  ; 
that  he  addressed  him  by  name,  shook  hands  with  him, 
and  made  an  appointment  to  meet  him  again,  which 
the  latter  never  kept."  But  this  is  a  common  enough 
mystery  in  London  :  always  you  are  hearing  of  some 
man  who  was  met  one  day  in  a  city  crowd,  and  then 
disappeared  as  by  magic  and  from  that  day  forth 
could  never  be  heard  of  any  more.  Not  so  common 
is  that  mystery  of  the  elegant,  fascinating  Mr. 
Altamont,  which  belongs  to  this  Mansion  House  end 
of  Cheapside.  The  story  is  told  by  Thackeray's  Mr. 
Yellowplush.  In  his  youth  he  was  Altamont's 
"  tiger,"  but  was  ignorant  of  his  master's  occupation. 


THE  POETRY  OF  CHEAPSIDE  73 

Altamont  "  had  some  business  in  the  city,  for  he  went 
in  every  morning  at  ten,  got  out  of  his  tilbry  at  the 
City  Road,  and  had  it  waiting  for  him  at  six  ;  when, 
if  it  was  summer,  he  spanked  round  into  the  Park, 
and  drove  one  of  the  neatest  turnouts  there."  Never- 
theless, he  lodged  shabbily  with  a  Mr.  and  i\Irs.  Shum 
out  at  Islington,  and  the  youthful  Yellowplush  "  slep 
over  the  way,  and  only  came  in  with  his  boots  and 
brexfast  of  a  morning."  Altamont  married  his  land- 
lady's daughter,  and  they  lived  in  "  a  genteel  house 
in  Islington  ;  "  he  always  had  plenty  of  money,  but 
would  not  tell  either  his  wife  or  her  family  anything 
of  his  trade  or  profession.  One  day,  when  Altamont 
had  been  drinking  unwisely,  he  let  slip  a  remark  that 
roused  his  wife's  suspicions  ;  and,  after  going  round  to 
consult  with  her  mother,  she  drove  next  morning  to 
the  city  and  reconnoitred  the  neighbourhood  of  the 
Bank  of  England.  "  She  walked  before  the  Bank, 
and  behind  the  Bank  :  she  came  home  disperryted, 
having  learned  nothink."  Then  her  mother  took  up 
the  pursuit,  and,  heavily  veiled,  went  day  after  day 
on  Altamont 's  track,  and  at  length  returned  in 
triumph,  and  called  on  her  daughter  to  announce  : 
"  Now,  my  love,  I  have  found  him.  Come  with  me 
tomorrow,  and  you  shall  know  all  !  "  Mr.  Yellowplush 
shall  relate  the  sequel : 

"  The  ladies  ncx  morning  set  out  for  the  City,  and  I  walked 
behind,  doing  the  genteel  thing,  with  a  nosegy  and  a  goold  stick. 
We  walked  down  the  New  Road — we  walked  down  the  City 
Road — we  walked  to  the  Bank.  We  were  crossing  from  that 
heddyfiz  to  the  other  side  of  Cornhill,  when  all  of  a  sudden 
missis  shreckcd,  and  fainted  spontaceously  away.  I  rushed 
forrard,  and  raised  her  in  my  arms,  spiling  thereby  a  new 


74  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

weskit  and  a  pair  of  crimson  smalcloes.  I  rushed  forrard,  I 
say,  very  nearly  knocking  down  the  old  sweeper  who  was 
hobbling  away  as  fast  as  posibl.  We  took  her  to  Birch's  ; 
we  provided  her  with  a  hackney  coach  and  every  lucksury, 
and  carried  her  home  to  Islington." 


In  a  word — as  Mr.  Yellowplush  shudders  to  relate, 
after  he  has  explained  how,  some  days  later,  a  recon 
ciliation  came  about — "  Mr.  Haltamont  swep  the  cross- 
ing from  the  Bank  to  Cornhill  !  "  And  if  you  have 
any  doubts  as  to  the  truth  of  the  story,  walk  a  few 
doors  up  Cornhill  and  here  to  this  day  is  Birch's — a 
unique  little  confectionery  shop,  with  a  low,  small- 
pancd  window — one  of  the  very  few  relics  that 
Cornhill  still  retains  of  an  age  that  is  gone. 


CHAPTER  IV 

UP   AND    DOWN   THE    CITY    ROAD 

COMING  from  the  foot  of  Holborn  along  Newgate 
Street  and  Cheapside  I  have  a  pleasant  feeling 
that  we  are  walking  over  ground  that  Dickens  has 
trodden  many  times  before  us.  There  is  a  Sketch  by 
Boz  in  which  he  writes,  "  We  had  been  lounging  one 
evening  down  Oxford  Street,  Holborn,  Cheapside, 
Finsbnry  Square,  and  so  on,"  and  somewhere  off  the 
City  Road  he  dropped  into  "  a  modest  public-house 
of  the  old  school,  with  a  little  old  bar,  and  a  little 
old  landlord,"  and  he  describes  the  company  he  found 
there  in  "  The  Parlour  Orator."  He  tramped  along 
the  City  Road  as  far  as  Pentonville  ;  and  before  we 
continue  on  the  main  route  I  have  mapped  out  for  us, 
I  want  to  branch  off  here,  at  the  end  of  the  Poultry, 
and  make  that  same  excursion  that  Dickens  made. 
There  arc  several  points  of  interest  to  be  noted  by  the 
way,  but  the  chief  end  of  our  digression  is  to  be  that 
house  mid-way  up  the  City  Road  where  Mr.  Micawber 
lived,  when  David  Copperficld  was  lodging  with  him. 

Except  for  the  Bank  of  England,  which  occupies 
all  the  eastern  side  of  it.  Prince's  Street  has  been  newly 
built  and  has  no  memories  ;  but  the  first  turning  on 
the  right,  round  by  the  back  of  the  Bank,  is  Lothbury 
— so  called,  according  to  Stow,  because  it  was,  in  his 
sixteenth   century,   the   work-place   of  many  copper 

75 


76  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

founders  who,  in  the  turning  and  polishing  of  their 
metal,  made  a  noise  that  was  peculiarly  loathsome  to 
the  passer-by.  A  few  paces  up  Lothbury  is  Token- 
house  Yard,  which  we  must  not  leave  unvisited. 
"When  Defoe's  rascally  young  Colonel  Jack  had  stolen 
a  purse  from  an  old  gentleman  near  St.  Swithin's 
Lane,  just  beyond  the  Mansion  House,  he  "  went 
directly  forward  into  the  broad  place  on  the  north 
side  of  the  Exchange,  then  scoured  down  Bartholomew 
Lane,  so  into  Tokenhouse  Yard,  into  the  alleys  that 
pass  through  thence  to  London  Wall,  so  through 
Moorgate,  and  sat  down  on  the  grass  in  the  second 
of  the  quarters  of  Moorfields,  towards  the  middle 
field."  Here  he  waited  till  his  associate,  Will,  joined 
him,  and  they  found  a  rich  paper  of  loose  diamonds 
in  the  purse.  Bartholomew  Lane  flanks  the  other 
side  of  the  Bank,  parallel  with  Prince's  Street,  and  will 
bring  you  to  the  Exchange,  and  St.  Swithin's  Lane, 
whence  Colonel  Jack  had  come.  Tokenhouse  Yard  is 
also  the  scene  of  a  dreadful  little  picture  in  Defoe's 
Journal  of  the  Plague  : 

"  Passing  through  Tokenhouse  Yard,  in  Lothbury,  of  a 
sudden  a  casement  violently  opened  just  over  my  head, 
and  a  woman  gave  three  frightful  schreeces,  and  then  cried, 
'  Oh  !  death,  death,  death  ! '  in  a  most  inimitable  tone,  and 
which  struck  me  with  horror  and  a  chillness  in  my  very  blood. 
There  was  nobody  to  be  seen  in  the  whole  street,  neither  did 
any  other  window  open,  for  people  had  no  curiosity  now  in 
any  case,  nor  could  anybody  help  one  another  ;  so  I  went  on 
to  pass  into  Bell  Alley." 

The  Tokenhouse  Yard  that  the  Plague  reduced  to 
such  a  state  of  desolation  and  helpless  despair  went 
down  in  the  Great  Fire,  and  most  of  it  has  been  re- 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD         77 

built  more  than  once  since  then ;  its  importance 
centres  to-day  in  its  famous  Auction  Mart ;  but  it 
still  wears  an  old-world  air  and  has  subtle  touches  of 
age  about  it.  A  tunnel  through  the  house  at  the  inner 
end  brings  you  into  what  used  to  be  Bell  Alley,  where 
Defoe  witnessed  another  harrowing  incident  of  the 
I  Plague  ;  and  the  narrow  Alley  takes  you  to  Moor- 
gate  Street  and,  continuing  across  the  road,  runs  into 
Coleman  Street.  Mr.  Pickwick,  you  know,  whilst  he 
was  staying  at  the  George  and  Vulture,  in  George 
Yard,  Lombard  Street,  was  arrested  for  debt  by  a 
gentleman  who  presented  a  card  inscribed  :  "  Namby, 
Bell  Alley,  Coleman  Street."  He  and  his  assistant, 
Smouch,  carried  Mr.  Pickwick  off  in  a  coach  to  Coleman 
Street,  and  "  the  coach  having  turned  into  a  very 
narrow  and  dark  street,  stopped  before  a  house  with 
iron  bars  to  all  the  windows  ;  the  door-posts  of  which 
were  graced  by  the  name  and  title  of  '  Namby,  Officer 
to  the  Sheriffs  of  London  ;  '  the  inner  gate  having  been 
opened  by  a  gentleman  who  might  have  been  a  neglected 
twin-brother  of  Mr.  Smouch,  and  who  was  endowed 
with  a  large  key  for  the  purpose,  Mr.  Pickwick  was 
shown  into  the  '  coffee-room.'  "  When  I  first  knew 
the  Alley,  there  was  a  house  on  the  south  side,  near  the 
Coleman  Street  end,  that  had  bars  across  its  windows, 
and  I  accepted  it  unhesitatingly  as  Namby 's  ;  but 
nothing  remains  of  it  now  ;  all  that  side  of  the  Alley 
is  taken  up  by  the  blind  side  walls  of  monster  buildings 
that  have  their  doors  in  Moorgate  and  in  Coleman 
Streets. 

In  the  days  of  the  Commonwealth  Coleman  Street 
was  a  hotbed  of  Puritanism ;  Cowley  used  it  as 
a  background  for  his  comedy,   "  Cutter  of  Coleman 


78  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Street ;  "  but  it  had  acquired  that  reputation  much 
eariier :  when  James  I.  was  King,  and  when  Ben 
Jonson's  Justice  Clement  had  his  house  in  the  Street, 
for  you  find  Mistress  Chremylus,  in  Randolph's  Hey 
for  Honesty,  protesting  :  "I'll  be  sworn  the  lay 
clergy,  while  they  were  a-preaching  at  Bell  Alley  and 
Coleman  Street,  I  came  by  with  my  basket  :  the 
hungry  rascals  in  pure  zeal  had  like  to  eat  up  my 
gingerbread,  had  there  not  been  Popish  pictures  upon 
it.  I  had  much  ado  to  keep  them  from  scrambling 
my  apples  too,  had  not  the  sets  of  my  old  ruff  looked 
like  so  many  organ  pipes  and  frightened  them  !  " 
If  you  have  read  Trollope's  Prime  Minister  you  may 
remember  that  in  Coleman  Street  were  the  offices  of 
that  notable  Mining  Company  in  which  the  cunning 
Lopez  was  so  deeply  interested,  and  the  Street  is 
largely  made  up  of  such-like  offices  to  this  day. 

London  Wall  cuts  off  the  northern  end  of  Coleman 
Street  ;  up  London  Wall  to  the  left  is  the  church 
of  St.  Giles's,  Cripplegate,  where  Milton,  and  Chap- 
man, the  Elizabethan  dramatist,  are  buried ;  a 
portion  of  the  old  Roman  city  wall  is  still  standing 
in  the  churchyard.  But  go  to  the  end  of  Coleman 
Street,  and  across  Fore  Street  is  Moorfields,  to  which 
we  have  already  made  some  reference,  and  Moor- 
fields takes  you  to  Ropemaker  Street,  which  was 
Ropemaker  Alley  when  Defoe  died  in  it.  Here 
we  are  beyond  the  city  wall,  and  hereabouts  were 
those  Moorfields  that  Colonel  Jack  frequented,  and 
where  Bobadil  lived.  Turn  off  to  the  right  through 
Ropemaker  Street  and  we  are  out  on  Finsbury  Pave- 
ment, with  Moorgate  Street  and  the  site  of  the  old 
gateway  in  London  Wall  well  behind  us.     But  see 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        79 

how  difficult  it  is  to  make  progress  through  a  dis- 
trict so  crowded  with  memories  !  The  very  next 
turning  is  Chiswell  Street,  and  glancing  along  it 
you  may  see  the  comer  of  Bunhill  Row,  where  Milton 
lived  when  he  was  writing  "  Paradise  Lost  ;  "  where 
Dryden  visited  him  ;   and  where  he  died. 

We  will  not  go  round  that  way,  though,  for  Bun- 
hill  Row  has  been  drearily  altered,  and  would  bring 
us  back  into  the  City  Road  through  a  neighbour- 
hood that,  as  a  citizen  of  London  and  a  normal 
human  creature,  I  can  never  traverse  without  being 
depressed  by  a  sense  of  bewilderment  and  unspeak- 
able shame.  There  are  long  streets  between  the 
Row  and  the  City  Road,  a  wide  area  of  them,  whence 
we  have  cleared  away  a  squalid  lot  of  little  old  houses 
and  put  up  in  their  place  mass  after  mass  of  gaunt 
and  gloomy  Workmen's  Dwellings.  There  are  whole 
streets  full  of  these  inhuman  rookeries,  these  sanitary 
piggeries,  and  that  a  Christian  people  could  have 
built  such  godless  and  debasing  piles  believing  them 
fit  for  men  and  women  to  inhabit,  for  children  to  be 
born  in  and,  with  such  an  environment,  reared  to 
live  decent  and  blameless  lives,  passes  my  com- 
prehension. It  passes  my  understanding,  too,  that 
any  mortal  man  having  a  pleasant  residence  for 
himself,  his  wife  and  little  ones,  could  in  any  way 
sanction  the  building  of  such  grossly  unsanctified 
barracks  and  think  them  good  homes  for  other  human 
souls,  though  he  knows  that  in  no  circumstances 
would  he  consider  them  good  enough  for  himself. 
Cheerless,  hideous,  gigantic  structures  they  are, 
that  even  age  and  dirt,  that  make  most  other  things 
picturesque,  can  only  make  more  hideous  and  more 


80  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

repellent.  Each  is  squared  about  an  asphalted 
courtyard  that  is  too  deeply  shut-in  for  the  sun  to 
reach  down  to  it,  and  in  these  barren  squares  you 
shall  see  swarms  of  little  children  playing,  spindlyJ 
ragged  little  things,  for  the  most  part,  bleached  for* 
want  of  the  sun,  thin  and  bloodless  from  insufficient 
feeding,  and  yet  we  thrill  with  pride  when  we  tell 
each  other  that  rich  and  poor  in  this  favoured  country 
are  amenable  to  the  same  law,  as  if  that  were  the 
very  height  of  justice  ;  whereas,  if  you  reflect  upon 
it,  nothing  could  be  more  crudely  and  unintelli- 
gently  unjust.  There  ought  to  be  one  law  for  the 
rich  and  another  for  the  poor,  and  the  law  for  the 
rich  should  be  far  the  more  stringent  of  the  two. 
What  right  have  we  to  expect  the  lives  that  are 
brought  to  maturity  in  those  swarming,  villainously 
ugly  Workmen's  Dwellings  to  be  as  honest,  as  cleanly, 
as  moral  as  the  lives  that  are  nurtured  in  stately 
and  beautiful  country  mansions  or  healthful  houses 
of  the  suburbs  ?  Certainly,  if  only  of  him  to  whom 
much  is  given  shall  much  be  required,  we  are  not 
entitled  to  expect  anything  whatever  of  the  poverty- 
smitten  multitude  that  live  in  the  dreary,  desolate 
waste  of  Workmen's  Dwellings  that  is  shamefully 
hidden  away  behind  the  western  side  of  the  City 
Road. 

By-and-by.  we  shall  have  to  see  more  of  such 
soul-blighting  places  as  these,  because  some  of 
Gissing's  imaginary  people  happened  to  live  in  one 
of  them  ;  but  for  the  moment  we  will  keep  out  along 
the  City  Road  and  say  no  more  of  the  deformities 
in  its  byways. 

If  this  were  a  book  about  real  people  we  should 


^      WALNUT  T/Z££    W.-^LM^ 

'  /I//  l.amhi'tli  is  thick  inith  mciiiorii-s  n/  Tliyrza.     /.yi/in  and  Tliyi-zci  lodgcii  there  in 
Walnut  Tree  Walk." 

Chapter  S 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        81 

have  to  go  into  Bunhill  Fields  Burial  Ground, 
where  Defoe  is  buried,  and  Bunyan,  Blake, 
Richard  Cromwell,  Stnidwick,  the  Snow  Hill  grocer 
in  whose  house  Bunyan  died,  Wesley's  mother,  and 
many  another  whose  memory  still  haunts  these 
London  streets.  And  facing  Bunhill  Fields  is 
Wesley's  Chapel,  in  the  graveyard  of  which  Wesley 
has  his  last  resting  place.  But  we  are  getting  too 
entangled  in  realities,  and  have  no  proper  business 
with  anything  until  we  come  to  the  corner  of  Old 
Street,  which  opens  left  and  right  of  us.  To  the 
right  is  that  Hoxton  (then  Hogsden)  where  Ben 
Jonson's  Master  Knowell  and  his  son  lived ;  all 
about  there  was  Hoxton  Fields,  to  which  there  are 
so  many  references  in  Every  Man  in  His  Humour, 
and  once  in  Hoxton  Fields  Ben  Jonson  fought  a 
duel  with  Gabriel  Spencer,  the  player,  and  killed 
him.  Curtain  Road  is  along  there,  commemorating 
the  old  Curtain  Theatre  with  which  Shakespeare 
was  associated  when  he  first  came  to  London,  and 
at  the  far  end  of  Old  Street  is  Shoreditch  church, 
in  whose  churchyard  lie  some  of  the  Curtain's  famous 
actors,  men  who  were  friends  of  Shakespeare.  And 
that  same  end  of  the  street,  which  has  Shoreditch 
station  at  one  of  its  corners,  has  associations  with 
Gissing's  Nether  World.  If  you  go  down  there  you 
will  find  two  or  three  Italian  pastrycooks'  shops, 
any  one  of  which  may  be  the  one  in  which  Bob 
Hewett  had  a  memorable  conversation  with  Clem 
Peckovcr,  of  whom  we  shall  see  more  in  a  later 
chapter.  Clem  had  married  the  prodigal  Joseph 
Snowden,  and  was  anxious  that  Bob's  wife,  Pene- 
lope, otherwise  Pcnnyloaf,  should  be  on  good  terms 
6 


82  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

again  with  her  husband's  daughter  by  his  first  wife, 
because  Jane  Snowden  was  Hving  with  Joseph's 
father,  at  Hanover  Street,  IsHngton,  and  the  old 
man  was  beHeved  to  have  money. 

"  In  Old  Street,  not  far  from  Shoreditch  Station,  was  a  shabby 
little  place  of  refreshment,  kept  by  an  Italian  ;  pastry  and 
sweet-stuff  filled  the  window  ;  at  the  back  of  the  shop,  through 
a  doorway  on  each  side  of  which  was  looped  a  pink  curtain, 
a  room,  furnished  with  three  marble-topped  tables,  invited 
those  who  wished  to  eat  and  drink  more  at  ease  than  was 
possible  before  the  counter.  Except  on  Sunday  evening  this 
room  was  very  little  used,  and  there,  on  the  occasion  of  which 
I  speak,  Clem  was  sitting  with  Bob  Hewett.  They  had  been 
having  supper  together — French  pastry  and  a  cup  of  cocoa. 

"  She  leaned  forward  on  her  elbows,  and  said  imperatively, 
'  Tell  Pennyloaf  to  make  it  up  with  her  again.' 

"  '  Why  ?  ' 

"  '  Because  I  want  to  know  what  goes  on  in  Hanover  Street. 
You  was  a  fool  to  send  her  away,  and  you'd  ought  to  have 
told  me  about  it  before  now.  If  they  was  such  friends,  I  suppose 
the  girl  told  her  lots  o'  things.  But  I  expect  they  see  each 
other  just  the  same.  You  don't  suppose  she  does  all  you  tell 
her?' 

"  '  I'll  bet  you  what  you  like  she  does  1 '  cried  Bob. 

"  Clem  glared  at  him. 

"  '  Oh,  you  an'  your  Pennyloaf !  Likely  she  tells  you  the 
truth.  You're  so  fond  of  each  other,  ain't  you  !  Tells  you 
everything,  does  she  ? — the  way  you  treat  her  ! ' 

"  '  Who's  always  at  me  to  treat  her  worse  still  t '  Bob 
retorted  half  angrily,  half  in  expostulation. 

"  '  Well,  and  so  I  am,  'cause  I  hate  the  name  of  her  !  I'd 
like  to  hear  as  you  starve  her  and  her  brats  half  to  death. 
How  much  money  did  you  give  her  last  week  ?  Now  just 
you  tell  me  the  truth.    How  much  was  it  ?  ' 

"  '  How  can  I  remember  }     Three  or  four  bob,  I  s'pose.' 

"  '  Three  or  four  bob  ! '  she  repeated,  snarling.     '  Give  her 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        83 

one,  and  make  her  live  all  the  week  on  it.  Wear  herdown  ! 
Make  her  pawn  all  she  has,  and  go  cold  ! ' 

"  Her  cheeks  were  on  fire  ;  her  eyes  started  in  the^fury  of 
jealousy  ;  she  set  her  teeth  together. 

"  '  I'd  better  do  for  her  altogether,'  Bob  said,  with  an  evil 
grin. 

•'  Clem  looked  at  him,  without  speaking  ;  kept  her  gaze 
on  him  ;  then  said  in  a  thick  voice  : 

"  '  There's  many  a  true  word  spoke  in  joke.' 

"  Bob  moved  uncomfortably.  There  was  a  brief  silence, 
then  the  other,  putting  her  face  nearer  his  : 

"  '  Not  just  yet.  I  want  to  use  her  to  get  all  I  can  about 
that  girl  and  her  old  beast  of  a  grandfather.'  .  .  . 

"  There  came  nosies  from  the  shop.  Three  work-girls  had 
just  entered  and  were  buying  cakes,  which  they  began  to  eat 
at  the  counter.  They  were  loud  in  gossip  and  laughter,  and 
their  voices  rang  like  brass  against  brass.  .  .  . 

"  '  What  do  you  expect  to  know  from  that  girl  ?  '  inquired 
Bob. 

"  '  Lots  o'  things.  I  want  to  know  what  the  old  bloke's 
goin'  to  do  with  his  money,  don't  1  ?  And  I  want  to  know 
what  my  beast  of  a  'usband's  got  out  of  him.  And  I  want 
to  know  what  that  feller  Kirkwood's  goin'  to  do.'   .   .   . 

"  He  shuffled  with  his  feet,  then  rose. 

"  '  Where  can  I  see  you  on  Wednesday  morning  ?  '  asked 
Clem.     '  I  want  to  hear  about  that  girl.' 

"  '  It  can't  be  Wednesday  morning.  I  tell  you  I  shall  be 
getting  the  sack  next  thing  ;  they've  promised  it.  Two  days 
last  week  I  wasn't  at  the  shop,  and  one  day  this.  It  can't 
go  on.' 

"  His  companion  retorted  angrily,  and  for  five  minutes  they 
stood  in  embittered  colloquy.  It  ended  in  Bob's  turning  away 
and  going  out  into  the  street,  ("lem  followed,  and  they  walked 
westwards  in  silence.  Reaching  City  Road,  and  crossing  to 
the  corner  where  lowers  St.  Luke's  Hospital — grim  abode  of 
the  insane,  here  in  the  midst  of  London's  squalor  and  uproar — 
they  halted  to  take  leave.  The  last  words  they  exchanged, 
after  making  an  appointment,  were  of  brutal  violence." 


84  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

We  are  at  the  corner  where  Clem  and  Bob  Hewett 
parted,  by  the  asylum  of  St.  Luke's.  Another  two 
minutes'  walk  up  the  City  Road  and  we  reach  Shep- 
herdess Walk,  with  the  Eagle  Tavern  at  its  corner, 
and  adjoining  it  the  Salvation  Army  premises  that 
used  to  be  the  old  Grecian  Theatre.  In  its  prime 
the  Eagle  was  a  great  place  of  entertainment,  a  sort 
of  Vauxhall  Gardens  on  an  inferior  scale.  It  is 
immortalised  in  the  nonsensical  old  catch  : 

Up  and  down  the  City  Road, 

In  and  out  the  Eagle, 
That's  the  way  the  money  goes, 

Pop  goes  the  weasel ! 

and  in  "  Miss  Evans  and  the  Eagle,"  which,  you  may 
remember,  in  the  Sketches  hy  Boz.  Miss  Evans  lived 
with  her  parents  at  Camden  Town,  and  the  little 
journeyman  carpenter,  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins,  who 
was  deeply  in  love  with  her,  called  at  the  house 
"  one  Monday  afternoon  in  his  best  attire,  with 
his  face  more  shining  and  his  waistcoat  more  bright 
than  either  had  ever  appeared  before.  The  family 
were  just  going  to  tea,  and  were  so  glad  to  see  him." 
He  had  brought  a  pint  of  shrimps  with  him  "  to 
propitiate  Mrs.  Ivins,"  and  sat  down  chatting  affably 
while  the  two  youngest  Miss  Ivinses  made  the  kettle 
boil,  Jemima  being  upstairs  "  cleaning  herself  "  : 

"  '  I  vos  a  thinking,'  said  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins,  during  a 
pause  in  the  conversation — '  I  vos  a  thinking  of  taking  J'mima 
to  the  Eagle  to-night.' — '  0  my  ! '  exclaimed  Mrs.  Ivins.  '  Lor  1 
how  nice  ! '  said  the  youngest  Miss  Ivins.  '  Well,  I  declare  ! ' 
added  the  youngest  Miss  Ivins  but  one.  '  Tell  J'mima  to  put 
on  her  white  muslin,  Tilly,'  screamed  Mrs.  Ivins,  with  motherly 
anxiety  ;  and  down  came  J'mima  herself  soon  afterwards  in 
a  white  muslin  gown  carefully  hooked  and  eyed,  and  a  little 


UP  AND  DO^VN  THE  CITY  ROAD         85 

red  shawl,  plentifully  pinned,  and  white  straw  bonnet  trimmed 
with  red  ribbons,  and  a  small  necklace,  and  large  pair  of 
bracelets,  and  Denmark  satin  shoes,  and  open-worked  stockings, 
white  cotton  gloves  on  her  fingers,  and  a  cambric  pocket- 
handkerchief,  carefully  folded  up,  in  her  hand— all  quite 
genteel  and  ladylike.  And  away  went  Miss  J'mima  Ivins 
and  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins,  and  a  dress  cane  with  a  gilt  knob  at 
the  top,  to  the  admiration  and  envy  of  the  street  in  general, 
and  to  the  high  gratification  of  Mrs.  Ivins  and  the  two  youngest 
Miss  Ivinses  in  particular.  They  had  no  sooner  turned  into 
the  Pancras  Road  than  who  should  Miss  J'mima  Ivins  stumble 
upon  by  the  most  fortunate  accident  in  the  world  but  a  young 
lady  as  she  knew,  with  her  young  man  ;  and  it  is  so  strange 
how  things  do  turn  out  sometimes — they  were  actually  going 
to  the  Eagle  too.  So  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins  was  introduced  to 
Miss  J'mima  Ivins's  friend's  young  man,  and  they  all  walked 
on  together,  talking,  and  laughing,  and  joking  away  like  any- 
thing ;  and  when  they  got  as  far  as  Pentonville,  Miss  Ivins's 
friend's  young  man  would  have  the  ladies  go  into  the  Crown 
to  taste  some  shrub,  which,  after  a  great  blushing  and  giggling, 
and  hiding  of  faces  in  elaborate  pocket-handkerchiefs,  they 
consented  to  do.  Having  tasted  it  once,  they  were  easily 
prevailed  upon  to  taste  it  again  ;  and  they  sat  out  in  the 
garden  tasting  shrub  and  looking  at  the  busses  alternately, 
till  it  was  just  the  proper  time  to  go  to  the  Eagle  ;  and  then 
they  resumed  their  journey,  and  walked  very  fast,  for  fear 
they  should  lose  the  beginning  of  the  concert  in  the  Rotunda. 
'  How  ev'nly  ! '  said  Miss  J'mima  Ivins,  and  Miss  J'mima  Ivins's 
friend,  both  at  once,  when  they  passed  the  gate  and  were  fairly 
inside  the  gardens.  There  were  the  walks  beautifully  gravelled 
and  planted,  and  the  refreshment  boxes  painted  and  orna- 
mented like  so  many  snuff-boxes,  and  the  variegated  lamps 
shedding  their  rich  light  upon  the  company's  heads,  and  the 
place  for  dancing  ready  chalked  for  the  company's  feet,  and  a 
Moorish  band  playing  at  one  end  of  the  gardens  and  an  opposi- 
tion military  band  playing  away  at  the  other." 

Everything    went    well    until    a    gentleman    with 


86  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

large  whiskers  persisted  in  staring  at  Miss  J'mima 
Ivins,  and  a  gentleman  in  a  plaid  waistcoat  flattered 
her  friend  with  similar  attentions.  Well,  the  Eagle 
has  gone  and  a  new  tavern  has  risen  on  its  ashes, 
but  here  is  the  ground  upon  which  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins 
and  Miss  Ivins's  friend's  young  man  came  out,  very 
much  damaged,  after  a  furious  affray  with  those 
two  intrusive  strangers,  to  carry  their  hysterical 
and  remorseful  ladies  home  in  a  hackney  coach. 

Two  or  three  minutes  beyond  Shepherdess  Walk, 
and  we  are  at  Windsor  Terrace.  Now,  the  City 
Road  is  the  shabbiest,  the  most  carelessly  untidy 
of  all  the  great  highways  into  London.  The  best 
of  its  shops  are  dully  or  garishly  respectable  ;  the 
worst  of  them  have  a  dusty,  littered,  hugger-mugger, 
neglected  look  that  would  disgrace  a  back  alley  in 
the  East  End.  The  northern  part  of  the  Road  is 
made  up  of  dingy,  tired-looking  private  houses, 
with  dingy,  depressed  gardens  in  front  of  them — 
houses  that  look  as  if  they  had  once  been  rural  and 
belonged  to  a  country  town,  but  had  come  to  London 
and  been  so  long  in  it  that  they  have  grown  haggard, 
sophisticated,  disheartened.  At  one  point  the  road 
is  patched  together  with  a  dowdy  canal  bridge,  over 
whose  parapets  you  see  a  dirty,  sluggish  canal,  its 
banks  strewn  with  piles  of  coal  and  high,  unsightly 
stacks  of  timber.  If  there  is  any  more  grubby, 
slovenly,  slatternly  highway  into  London  than  this 
I  have  never  trodden  it.  Yet  Windsor  Terrace 
alone  clothes  it  in  glorj^  and  I  should  be  grieved 
to  see  it  cleaned  or  tidied  or  improved  in  any  way, 
simply  because,  as  it  is,  it  is  Windsor  Terrace's  fit 
and  proper  environment.     There  have  been  changes 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        87 

in  it,  but  not  enough,  I  am  thankful  to  say,  to  spoil 
its  mid- Victorian  aspect  ;  it  is  still  very  much  what 
it  was  when  Micawber  went  up  and  down  it,  to  and 
from  his  home  here  ;  and  of  all  the  great  humorous 
characters  who  live  in  the  world's  fiction  there  are 
only  two  greater  than  he,  Falstaff  being  one  and 
Don  Quixote  the  other. 

Windsor  Terrace  is  a  high,  drab  street  shaped  like 
a  funnel.  The  outer,  crescent-shaped  portions,  with 
some  half  dozen  houses  in  each,  slope  back  from  the 
City  Road,  and  the  open  space  thus  left  before  the 
long,  narrow  channel  of  the  rest  of  the  street  looks 
as  if  it  should  have  been  a  sort  of  village  green,  but 
it  is  all  paved  over,  and  there  is  a  lamp-post  in  the 
centre,  two  lamp-posts  on  each  side,  and  dwarf 
iron  pillars  round  about  it  instead  of  trees.  Micawber 
lived  in  the  wide  part  of  the  funnel,  in  one  of  these 
six  houses  on  the  city  side  of  it  :  you  know  that  as 
soon  as  you  set  eyes  on  them,  for  they  are  exactly 
in  keeping  with  all  we  know  of  him,  and  so  subtly 
answer  to  all  the  hints  Dickens  gives  of  the  char- 
acteristics of  his  residence.  They  are  tall,  plain, 
shabby-genteel  houses,  with  raUed-in  areas  before 
their  basement  windows  and  steps  up  to  their  front 
doors.  When  David  Coppcrfield  arrived  at  the  black- 
ing factory  in  Blackfriars  Road,  where  he  was  to 
work  with  Mealy  Potatoes  and  the  other  boys  at 
labelling  bottles,  he  was  informed  by  the  manager, 
Mr.  Quinion,  that  his  step-father  had  arranged  for 
him  to  lodge  with  Mr.  Micawber,  and  Mr.  Micawber 
called  during  the  morning  to  be  introduced  to  his 
small  lodger  : 

"  '  My  address/  said  Mr.  Micawber^  '  is  Windsor  Terrace, 


88  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

City  Road.     I — in  short/  said  Mr.  Micawber,  with  the  same 
genteel  air^  and  in  another  burst  of  confidence — '  I  live  there.' 

"  I  made  him  a  bow. 

"  '  Under  the  impression/  said  Mr.  Micawber^  '  that  your 
peregrinations  in  this  metropolis  have  not  as  yet  been  extensive, 
and  that  you  might  have  some  difficulty  in  penetrating  the 
arcana  of  the  Modern  Babylon  in  the  direction  of  the  City 
Road — in  short/  said  Mr.  Micawber,  in  another  burst  of  confi- 
dence, '  that  you  might  lose  yourself — I  shall  be  happy  to  call 
this  evening,  and  instal  you  in  the  knowledge  of  the  nearest 
way.'   .   .   . 

"  Mr.  Quinion  then  formally  engaged  me  to  be  as  useful  as 
I  could  in  the  warehouse  of  Murdstone  and  Grinby,  at  a  salary, 
I  think,  of  six  shillings  a  week.  I  am  not  clear  whether  it  was 
six  or  seven.  I  am  inclined  to  believe,  from  my  uncertainty 
on  this  head,  that  it  was  six  at  first  and  seven  afterwards.  He 
paid  me  a  week  down  (from  his  own  pocket,  I  believe),  and  I 
gave  Mealy  sixpence  out  of  it  to  get  my  trunk  carried  to  Windsor 
Terrace  at  night :  it  being  too  heavy  for  my  strength,  small  as 
it  was.  I  paid  sixpence  more  for  my  dinner,  which  was  a 
meat-pie  and  a  turn  at  a  neighbouring  pump  ;  and  passed  the 
hour  which  was  allowed  for  that  meal,  in  walking  about  the 
streets. 

"  At  the  appointed  time  in  the  evening,  Mr.  Micawber  re- 
appeared. I  washed  my  hands  and  face,  to  do  the  greater 
honour  to  his  gentility,  and  we  walked  to  our  house,  as  I  suppose 
I  must  now  call  it,  together  ;  Mr.  Micawber  impressing  the 
names  of  streets,  and  the  shapes  of  corner  houses  upon  me, 
as  we  went  along,  that  I  might  find  my  way  back  easily  in  the 
morning. 

"  Arrived  at  his  house  in  Windsor  Terrace  (which  I  noticed 
was  shabby  like  himself,  but  also,  like  himself,  made  all  the 
show  it  could),  he  presented  me  to  Mrs.  Micawber,  a  thin  and 
faded  lady,  not  at  all  young,  who  was  sitting  in  the  parlour 
(the  first  floor  was  altogether  unfurnished,  and  the  blinds  were 
kept  down  to  delude  the  neighbours),  with  a  baby  at  her  breast. 
This  baby  was  one  of  twins  ;  and  I  may  remark  here  that  I 
hardly  ever,  in  all  my  experience  of  the  family,  saw  both  of  the 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        89 

twins  detached  from  Mrs.  Micawber  at  the  same  time.  One  of 
them  was  always  taking  refreshment.  There  were  two  other 
children  ;  Master  Micawber,  aged  about  four,  and  Miss  Micawber, 
aged  about  three.  These,  and  a  dark-complexioned  young 
woman,  with  a  habit  of  snorting,  who  was  servant  to  the  family 
and  informed  me  before  half-an-hour  had  expired  that  she  was 
'  a  Orfling,'  and  came  from  St  Luke's  workhouse  in  the  neighbour- 
hood, completed  the  establishment.  My  room  was  at  the  top 
of  the  house,  at  the  back :  a  close  chamber ;  stencilled  all 
over  with  an  ornament  which  my  young  imagination  repre- 
sented as  a  blue  muffin  ;  and  very  scantily  furnished.  .  .  . 

"  Poor  Mrs.  Micawber  !  She  said  she  had  tried  to  exert 
herself ;  and  so,  I  have  no  doubt,  she  had.  The  centre  of  the 
street-door  was  perfectly  covered  with  a  great  brass  plate,  on 
which  was  engraved  '  Mrs.  Micawber's  Boarding  Establishment 
for  Young  Ladies  : '  but  I  never  found  that  any  young  lady 
had  ever  been  to  school  there ;  or  that  any  young  lady  ever 
came,  or  proposed  to  come  ;  or  that  the  least  preparation  was 
ever  made  to  receive  any  young  lady.  The  only  visitors  I  ever 
saw  or  heard  of  were  creditors.  They  used  to  come  at  all  hours, 
and  some  of  them  were  quite  ferocious.  One  dirty-faced 
man,  I  think  he  was  a  bootmaker,  used  to  edge  himself  into 
the  passage  as  early  as  seven  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  call 
up  the  stairs  to  Mr.  Micawber — '  Come  !  You  ain't  out  yet, 
you  know.  Pay  us,  will  you  ?  Don't  hide,  you  know  ;  that's 
mean.  I  wouldn't  be  mean  if  I  was  you.  Pay  us,  will  you  ? 
You  just  pay  us,  d'you  hear  ?  Come  ! '  Receiving  no  answer 
to  these  taunts,  he  would  mount  in  his  wrath  to  the  words 
'  swindlers  '  and  '  robbers  '  ;  and  these  being  ineffectual  too, 
would  sometimes  go  to  the  extremity  of  crossing  the  street  and 
roaring  up  at  the  windows  of  the  second  floor,  where  he  knew 
Mr.  Micawber  was.  At  these  times,  Mr.  Micawber  would  be 
transported  with  grief  and  mortification,  even  to  the  length 
(as  I  was  once  made  aware  by  a  scream  from  his  wife)  of  making 
motions  at  himself  with  a  razor  ;  but  within  half  an  hour 
afterwards,  he  would  polish  up  his  shoes  with  extraordinary 
pains,  and  go  out  humming  a  tune  with  a  greater  air  of  gentility 
than  ever." 


90  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

When  Mr.  Micawber's  affairs  reached  such  a  crisis 
that  there  was  neither  food  in  the  house  here  nor 
money  to  buy  any,  Mrs.  Micawber  took  David  Copper- 
field  into  her  confidence  and,  though  she  refused  to 
accept  a  small  loan,  hinted  that  there  were  other 
ways  in  which  he  might  be  of  service  : 

"  '  I  have  parted  with  the  plate  myself/  said  Mrs.  Micawber. 
'  Six  tea,  two  salt,  and  a  pair  of  sugars  I  have  at  different 
times  borrowed  money  on,  in  secret,  with  my  own  hands.  But 
the  twins  are  a  great  tie  ;  and  to  me,  with  my  recollections  of 
papa  and  mama,  these  transactions  are  very  painful.  There 
are  still  a  few  trifles  that  we  could  part  with.  Mr.  Micawber's 
feelings  would  never  allow  him  to  dispose  of  them  ;  and 
Clickett ' — this  was  the  girl  from  the  workhouse — '  being  of  a 
vulgar  mind,  would  take  painful  liberties  if  so  much  confidence 
was  reposed  in  her.     Master  Copperfield,  if  I  might  ask  you — ' 

"  I  understood  Mrs.  Micawber  now,  and  begged  her  to  make 
use  of  me  to  any  extent.  I  began  to  dispose  of  the  more  port- 
able articles  of  property  that  very  evening  ;  and  went  out  on 
a  similar  expedition  almost  every  morning,  before  I  went  to 
Murdstone  and  Grinby's.  Mr.  Micawber  had  a  few  books  on  a 
little  chiffonier,  which  he  called  the  library  ;  and  those  went 
first.  I  carried  them,  one  after  another,  to  a  bookstall  in  the 
City  Road — one  part  of  which,  near  our  house,  was  almost  all 
bookstalls  and  birdshops  then — and  sold  them  for  whatever 
they  would  bring.  The  keeper  of  the  bookstall  who  lived  in  a 
little  house  behind  it,  used  to  get  tipsy  every  night,  and  to  be 
violently  scolded  by  his  wife  every  morning.  More  than  once, 
when  I  went  there  early,  I  had  audience  of  him  in  a  turn-up 
bedstead,  with  a  cut  in  his  forehead  or  a  black  eye,  bearing 
witness  to  the  excesses  overnight  (I  am  afraid  he  was  quarrel- 
some in  his  drink),  and  he  with  a  shaking  hand  endeavouring 
to  find  the  needful  shillings  in  one  or  other  of  the  pockets  of  his 
clothes,  which  lay  upon  the  floor,  while  his  wife,  with  the  baby 
in  her  arms  and  her  shoes  down  at  heel,  never  left  off  rating 
him.    Sometimes  he  had  lost  his  money,  and  then  he  would 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD         91 

ask  me  to  call  again  ;  but  his  wife  had  always  got  some — had 
taken  his,  I  dare  say,  while  he  was  drunk — and  secretly  com- 
pleted the  bargain  on  the  stairs,  as  we  went  down  together." 

That  part  of  the  City  Road,  "  near  our  house  " 
which  was  "  almost  all  bookstalls  and  birdshops," 
was  the  part  that  faces  the  end  of  Windsor  Terrace. 
It  remained  so,  with  little  alteration,  down  to  a 
few  years  ago  ;  shabby  little  bookshops  with  a  litter 
of  stalls  before  their  frontages  ;  and  I  bought  books 
at  some  of  the  bookstalls  not  knowing  that,  long 
before,  David  Copperfield  had  been  there  to  sell 
them.  They  have  been  wiped  right  out  now,  and 
a  mammoth  furniture  repository  has  usurped  their 
place,  but  adjacent  to  it  is  a  row  of  shops  that  are 
curiously  reminiscent  of  those  that  are  gone.  Seeing 
them  from  a  little  way  off  the  other  evening,  after 
the  gas  was  alight,  I  thought  for  a  moment  they 
were  a  few  of  the  old  shops  that  had  escaped  destruc- 
tion, but  a  nearer  view  dispelled  the  illusion  :  they 
are  new  shops,  larger  than  the  old,  with  nothing  of 
the  snoozy  quaintness  of  their  predecessors,  but 
there  is  a  happy  haphazard  carelessness  about  the 
way  in  which  the  goods  arc  just  left  lying  about 
anyhow  in  their  windows,  and  a  general  dusty, 
lounging  air  over  them  of  waiting  with  your  hands 
in  your  pockets  for  customers  to  drop  in  that  is 
tantalisingly  reminiscent  of  the  older  shops  that 
David  Copperfield  knew.  For,  as  I  have  said  before 
and  shall  have  occasion  to  say  again,  you  cannot 
give  a  London  street  a  new  character  by  pulling  it 
all  down  and  giving  it  new  houses.  Sooner  or  later 
the  old  character  subdues  the  new  houses  and  asserts 
itself,  generally  with  modifications,  but  not  always. 


92  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Mr.  Micawber's  affairs  came  to  such  a  pass  that 
he  was  arrested  for  debt  and  conveyed  to  the  King's 
Bench  Prison  in  the  Borough  ;  the  furniture  of  the 
house  in  Windsor  Terrace  was  nearly  all  sold  and  for 
a  while  David,  Mrs.  Micawber,  the  children,  and  the 
Orfling  "  encamped,  as  it  were,  in  the  two  parlours 
of  the  emptied  house  in  Windsor  Terrace,"  amid 
a  small  wreckage  of  bedding,  chairs  and  a  kitchen 
table.  Then  the  family  joined  Mr.  Micawber  in  the 
prison,  and  David,  having  taken  the  key  of  the  house 
to  the  landlord,  "  who  was  very  glad  to  get  it,"  took 
a  back  garret  over  Southwark  way,  so  as  to  be  as 
near  the  Micawbers  as  possible. 

If  you  pass  from  the  funnel-mouth  of  Windsor 
Terrace  into  its  narrow  throat,  you  find  the  tall 
houses  here  all  built  to  the  same  pattern  as  those 
we  associate  with  Micawber,  but  standing  so  much 
nearer  together  they  have  a  dingier,  gloomier  aspect, 
that  is  only  slightly  mitigated  in  the  case  of  one  or 
two  which  have  senemic,  draggled  creepers  stragg- 
ling over  them.  At  the  end  of  Windsor  Terrace, 
turn  ofi  to  the  left,  and  a  walk  of  five  minutes,  keep- 
ing straight  on,  will  take  you  to  the  Hanover  Street 
that  Clem  mentioned  to  Bob  Hewett,  where  Jane 
Snowden  was  living  with  her  grandfather.  It  is 
a  quiet,  out-of-the-way  street  of  little  houses  which, 
except  that  three  or  four  of  them  have  been  pulled 
down  to  make  room  for  a  County  Council  School, 
remains  much  as  it  was  while  Gissing  was  writing 
The  Nether  World.  When  old  Mr.  Snowden  returned 
from  abroad  and  found  his  grand-daughter,  Jane, 
living  in  squalid,  half-starved  misery,  the  household 
drudge  of  Mrs.  Peckover  and  Clem  in  ClerkenweU 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        93 

Close,  he  arranged  to  take  her  away,  and  Sidney 
Kirkwood,  who  had  always  pitied  and  befriended 
Jane,  set  himself  to  find  lodgings  for  them.  There 
was  no  accommodation  to  be  had  for  them  in  Tysoe 
Street,  Clerkenwell,  where  he  lived  himself,  so  he 
went  farther  afield  : 

"  He  paid  a  visit  the  next  evening  to  certain  acquaintances 
of  his  named  Byass,  who  had  a  house  in  Hanover  Street, 
Islington,  and  let  lodgings.  Hanover  Street  lies  to  the  north 
of  City  Road  ;  it  is  a  quiet  byway,  of  curving  form,  and  con- 
sists of  dwellings  only.  Squalor  is  here  kept  at  arm's  length  ; 
compared  with  regions  close  at  hand,  this  and  the  contiguous 
streets  have  something  of  a  suburban  aspect.  Three  or  four 
steps  led  up  to  the  house  door.  Sidney's  knock  summoned 
a  young,  healthy-faced,  comely  woman,  who  evinced  a  hearty 
pleasure  at  seeing  who  her  visitor  was.  She  brought  him  at 
once  into  a  parlour  on  the  ground  floor. 

"  '  Well,  an'  as  I  was  only  this  mornin'  tellin'  Sam  to  go  and 
look  after  you,  or  write  a  note,  or  somethin'  !  Why  can't  you 
come  round  oftener  ?  I've  no  patience  with  you  !  You  just 
sit  at  'ome  an'  get  humped,  an'  what's  the  good  of  that,  I 
should  like  to  know  ?  I  thought  you'd  took  offence  with  me, 
an'  so  I  told  Sam.  Do  you  want  to  know  how  baby  is  ?  Why 
don't  you  ask,  then,  as  you  ought  to  do  the  first  thing  ?  He's 
a  good  deal  better  than  he  deserves  to  be,  the  young  rascal — 
all  the  trouble  he  gives  me  !  He's  fast  asleep,  I'm  glad  to 
say,  so  you  can't  sec  him.  Sam'U  be  back  in  a  few  minutes  ; 
at  least  I  expect  him,  but  there's  no  knowin'  nowadays  when 
he  can  leave  the  warehouse.  What's  brought  you  to-night, 
I  wonder  ?  You  needn't  tell  me  anything  about  the  Upper 
Street  business.    /  know  all  about  that ! ' 

"  *  Oh,  do  you  ?    From  Clara  herself  ?  ' 

"  '  Yes.  Don't  talk  to  me  about  her  !  There  !  I'm  sick 
an'  tired  of  her — an'  so  are  you,  I  should  think,  if  you've  any 
sense  left.'  " 

The  Byasses  are  among  the  most  natural  as  well 


94  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

as  the  most  humorous  of  Gissing's  characters ; 
humour  being  the  rarest  thing  in  his  books.  Sam 
Byass  is  a  cheerful  ass  who  is  always  doing  and  say- 
ing fatuously  silly  things  under  the  impression  that 
they  are  funny,  his  wife  keenly  appreciating  his  wit 
and  encouraging  it  with  shrieks  of  laughter.  The 
cheap  happiness  of  their  lives  and  their  foolish  fond- 
ness of  each  other  is  as  wonderfully  realistic  as  the 
later  stage  of  their  career  when  they  drift  into  mis- 
understanding and  the  grey  tragedy  of  a  separation. 
Mrs.  Byass  has  rattled  on  a  good  deal  about  Clara 
Hewett,  and  Kirkwood's  chequereed  engagement  to 
her,  for  some  time  before  he  can  get  a  chance  to 
touch  on  the  object  of  his  visit.  Then  he  remarks, 
"I  see  you've  still  got  the  card  in  the  window.  I 
shouldn't  wonder  if  I  could  find  you  a  lodger  for 
those  two  top  rooms."  The  outcome  of  his  negotia- 
tions is  that  Jane  and  her  grandfather  duly  move 
into  the  two  top  rooms  here,  which  must  have  been 
the  attics,  for  the  houses  have  otherwise  only  base- 
ments, and  ground  and  first  floors,  and  on  one 
occasion  you  have  Jane  standing  at  the  front  door 
to  watch  the  Byasses  going  forth  on  a  short  holiday  : 

"  Then  she  went  upstairs.  On  the  first  floor  the  doors  of 
the  two  rooms  stood  open,  and  the  rooms  were  bare.  The 
lodgers  who  had  occupied  this  part  of  the  house  had  recently 
left ;  a  card  was  again  hanging  in  the  window  of  Bessie's 
parlour.  Jane  passed  up  the  succeeding  flight  and  entered 
the  chamber  that  looked  out  upon  Hanover  Street." 

Her  grandfather  sat  smoking  his  pipe  at  the  open 
window  ;  and  "  but  for  the  cry  of  a  milkman  or  a 
paper-boy  in  the  street,  no  sound  broke  the  quiet- 
ness of   the  summer   morning."     Thereafter,  Sidney 


UP  AND  DOWN  THE  CITY  ROAD        05 

Kirkwood  came  often  to  the  house  and  he  and  Jane, 
almost  before  they  were  aware  of  it,  drifted  into  love 
with  each  other,  but  there  was  to  be  no  happy  ending 
to  their  pleasant  romance,  for  reasons  which  we 
shall  have  to  touch  upon  later.  Jane's  shifty  and 
unscrupulous  father,  Joseph,  before  and  after  he 
had  married  Clem  Peckovcr,  was  also  a  frequent 
visitor,  hypocritically  scheming  to  win  his  daughter's 
affection  and  to  ferret  out  the  truth  as  to  the  sup- 
posed wealth  of  his  father,  and  on  at  least  one 
occasion  he  went  "  strolling  away  from  Hanover 
Street  in  Sidney's  company."  There  was  a  rainy 
evening  when  Sidney,  after  he  realised  that  he  was 
in  love  with  Jane,  and  shrank  from  seeing  her,  partly 
because  of  her  grandfather's  supposed  wealth,  partly 
because  of  his  lingering  loyalty  to  Clara  Hewett, 
was  wandering  about  Islington  in  search  of  new 
rooms  for  himself  and  "  found  himself  at  the  end 
of  Hanover  Street,  and  was  drawn  to  the  familiar 
house  ;  not,  however,  to  visit  the  Snowdens,  but 
to  redeem  a  promise  recently  made  to  Bessie  Byass, 
who  declared  herself  vastly  indignant  at  the  neglect 
with  which  he  treated  her.  So,  instead  of  going 
up  the  steps  to  the  front  door,  he  descended  into 
the  area."  And  there  was  a  later  day  when,  after 
old  Snowden  had  died  leaving  no  will  and  Joseph, 
who  had  come  in  for  all  the  money,  had  deserted 
his  wife  and  vanished,  Clem  provoked  a  furious  scene 
with  her  ancient  hag  of  a  mother  in  Clerkenwell 
Close,  and  finished  it  by  rushing  impetuously,  "  out 
of  Clerkenwell  CI(;se,  up  St.  John  Street  Road,  across 
City  Road,  down  to  Hanover  Street,  literally  running 
for  most   of  the  time.     Her  knock  at   Mrs.  Byass's 


96  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

door  was  terrific."  She  went  storming  in,  in  spite 
of  Mrs.  Byass's  attempts  to  keep  her  out,  and  bullied 
and  abused  Jane  for  her  father's  rascality,  until 
Mrs.  Byass  desperately  threatened  her  with  the 
police,  and  got  her  out  and  slammed  the  door  on 
her. 

If  you  loiter  along  the  street  and  think  of  these 
things  you  can  hardly  believe  that  they  did  not  all 
happen  here ;  that  these  stones  have  not  been 
trodden  by  the  men  and  women  who  seem  so  real 
to  you  and  whom  the  book  makes  you  so  intimately 
acquainted  with.  Gissing  himself  must  have  been 
up  and  down  it  many  times,  but  you  are  not  more 
acutely  conscious  of  his  presence  here  than  of  that 
of  those  people  of  his  imagination. 

Continuing  along  Hanover  Street,  and  Noel  Street, 
you  emerge  upon  Colebrook  Row,  and  if  you  follow 
the  winding  of  the  Row,  past  the  little  white  box 
of  a  cottage  in  which  Charles  Lamb  used  to  live, 
you  will  find  yourself  in  Upper  Street,  Islington, 
and  the  "  Upper  Street  business "  to  which  Mrs. 
Byass  has  referred  was  nothing  worse  than  that 
Clara  Hewett,  tired  of  living  penuriously  with  her 
father  and  step-mother,  had  taken  her  own  wilful 
way  and  obtained  a  situation  as  waitress  in  a  flashy 
eating-house  in  this  thoroughfare,  and  here  Sidney 
went  to  meet  her.  The  place  was  known  as  "  The 
Imperial  Restaurant  and  Luncheon  Bar,"  and  has 
its  counterpart  in  Upper  Street  to-day. 

"  The  front  shone  with  vermilion  paint ;  the  interior  was 
aflare  with  many  gas-jets  ;  in  the  window  was  disposed  a 
tempting  exhibition  of  '  snacks  '  of  fish,  cold  roast  fowls,  ham- 
sandwiches,  and  the  like  ;  whilst  farther  back  stood  a  cooking- 


JiiqH  Si-fzeeT 

Mr.  Et:riiii(tnt,  hcnetiolently  insftifcd,  o/iou-d  a  lecture  hall  in  a  room  (rucr  n 
saddler's  slw/>  in  High  Street,  Lamheth." 

Cha/>ter  S 


UP  AND  D0\^^  THE  CITY  ROAD         97 

stove,  whereon  frizzled  and  vapoured  a  savoury  mess  of 
sausages  and  onions.  Sidney  turned  away  a  few  paces.  The 
inclemency  of  the  night  made  Upper  Street — the  promenade 
of  a  great  district  on  account  of  its  spacious  pavement — 
less  frequented  than  usual ;  but  there  were  still  numbers  of 
people  about,  some  hastening  homewards,  some  sauntering 
hither  and  thither  in  the  familiar  way,  some  gathered  into 
gossiping  groups.  Kirkwood  was  irritated  by  the  conversation 
and  laughter  that  fell  on  his  ears,  irritated  by  the  distant 
strains  of  the  band,  irritated  above  all  by  the  fume  of  frying 
that  pervaded  the  air  for  many  yards  about  Mrs.  Tubbs's 
precincts.  He  observed  that  the  customers  tending  that  way 
were  numerous.  They  consisted  mainly  of  lads  and  young 
men  who  had  come  forth  from  neighbouring  places  of  enter- 
tainment. The  locality  and  its  characteristics  had  been 
familiar  to  him  from  youth  upwards  ;  but  his  nature  was  not 
subdued  to  what  it  worked  in,  and  the  present  fit  of  disgust 
was  only  an  accentuation  of  a  mood  by  which  he  was  often 
posesssed." 

Clara  came  out,  at  last,  and  they  went  up  the 
street  together  and  "  crossed  by  the  '  Angel '  and 
entered  St.  John  Street  Road,"  making  for  Clerken- 
well  Close. 

Mr.  Micawber  would  never  have  walked  from 
Blackfriars  Road  to  Windsor  Terrace  nowadays  ; 
nor  would  Miss  Evans  and  Mr.  Samuel  Wilkins  have 
walked  all  the  way  from  Camden  Town  to  the  Eagle  ; 
we  are  pampered  in  the  matter  of  travelling  ac- 
commodation and  have  lost  the  pedestrian  habit  ; 
so  we  will  take  a  tram  from  the  Angel,  which  was 
one  of  the  old  coaching  inns,  but  has  been  many 
times  rebuilt,  to  Finsbury  Pavement,  and  thence 
get  back  to  the  Bank,  from  which  we  started  on  our 
northern  pilgrimage. 


CHAPTER  V 

MR.    PICKWICK,    LIZZIE   HEXAM,    AND   SOME   OTHERS 

WHEN  Mr.  Cheeryble  discovered  Nicholas 
Nickleby  studying  the  advertisements  in  a 
Registry  Office  window  and  learned  that  he  was  in 
search  of  employment,  Jie  brought  him  from  Oxford 
Street  to  the  Bank  in  a  bus  and  took  him  to  the 
warehouse  of  Cheeryble  Brothers,  which  was  situ- 
ated in  "a  quiet  shady  little  square,"  somewhere 
"  along  Threadneedle  Street  and  through  some  lanes 
and  passages  to  the  right."  I  have  never  been  able 
to  identify  that  square,  nor,  I  confess,  have  I  ever 
been  able  to  find  two  such  heavenly  men  of  business 
as  the  Cheery bles.  In  Threadneedle  Street  were 
the  banking  premises  of  that  very  different  pair  of 
brothers.  Sir  Brian  and  Hobson  Newcome,  and 
thither  went  Colonel  Newcome  to  visit  them,  on 
his  return  after  long  absence  abroad.  It  was  in 
Threadneedle  Street,  too,  that  Gissing's  swaggering 
Mr.  Gammon,  of  The  Town  Traveller,  walking  from 
Norton  Folgate  towards  the  Bank,  was  overtaken 
on  a  memorable  occasion  by  the  mysterious  Mr. 
Greenacre,  and  they  retired,  for  purposes  of  con- 
versation, to  the  Bilboes,  a  snug  place  of  refresh- 
ment "  lurking  in  an  obscure  byway  between  the 
Bank  and  St.  Paul's."  And  just  beyond  the  other  end 
of  Threadneedle  Street,  in  New  Broad  Street,  is  Austin 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.      99 

Friars  where,  as  you  know  if  you  have  read  Martin 
Chuzzlewit,  John  Westlock  and  Tom  Pinch  called  at 
the  office  of  Mr.  Fips  who  had  intimated  that  he  was 
prepared  to  offer  Tom,  whom  Mr.  Pecksniff  had  re- 
cently discharged,  an  uncommonly  pleasant  situation. 

But  there  is  more  of  interest  up  this  other  side  of 
the  Royal  Exchange  ;  let  us  follow  in  the  footsteps 
of  Lucy  Snowc,  from  Charlotte  Bronte's  Vilette,  when 
she  came  out  that  March  morning,  on  her  first  visit 
to  London,  came  out  full  of  eager  excitement  and 
"  saw  and  felt  London  at  last.  ...  I  went  up  Corn- 
hill  ;  I  mixed  with  the  life  passing  along  ;  I  dared 
the  peril  of  crossings.  .  .  .  Since  those  days  I  have 
seen  the  West  End,  the  parks,  the  fine  squares  ; 
but  I  love  the  City  far  better.  The  City  seems  so 
much  more  in  earnest  ;  its  business,  its  rush,  its 
roar,  are  such  serious  things,  sights,  sounds."  I, 
too,  love  the  City  better  than  the  West  End,  not 
for  Lucy  Snowe's  reasons,  but  only,  I  think,  be- 
cause I  have  passed  more  of  my  days  thereabouts 
and  am  more  familiar  with  it. 

It  is  curious  how,  in  much  miscellaneous  reading, 
one  comes  upon  unimportant  passages  that  for  no 
reason  at  all,  or  merely  because  they  happen  to  have 
flashed  vivid  pictures  upon  the  mind,  one  readily 
recalls,  whilst  many  others  that  arc  worthier  of 
remembrance  have  been  as  easily  forgotten.  If  I 
begin  to  cast  about  now  for  what  memories  I  have 
of  Comhill,  almost  the  first  that  I  recapture  is  a 
vision  of  the  street  in  early  Stuart  times,  when  it 
was  made  up  of  picturesque  gabled  buildings  and 
goldsmiths  and  wealthy  merchants  lived  over  their 
shops  and  warehouses  in  it,  and  when  the  City  train 


100  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

band,  out  for  periodical  exercise,  marched  past  in 
the  roadway  in  all  its  military  bravery,  watched 
by  bright  eyes  from  windows  and  doors.  And  this 
simply  because  of  the  advice  that  Meercraft  gives 
to  Gilthead,  the  goldsmith,  as  to  the  career  he  should 
choose  for  his  son,  in  Ben  Jonson's  The  Devil  is  an 
Ass  : 

Gilthead.  But  now  I  had  rather  get  him  a  good  wife 
And  plant  him  in  the  country,  there  to  use 
The  blessing  I  shall  leave  him. 

Meercraft.  Out  upon't  ! 

And  lose  the  laudable  means  thou  hast  at  home  here 
To  advance  and  make  him  a  young  alderman  ? 
Buy  him  a  captain's  place,  for  shame  ;  and  let  him 
Into  the  world  early,  and  with  his  plume 
And  scarfs  march  through  Cheapside,  or  along  Cornhill 
And  by  the  virtue  of  those,  draw  down  a  wife 
There  from  a  window  worth  ten  thousand  pound  ! 

Or  because  of  a  strangely  clear  recollection  I  have 
of  Sybil,  the  sprightly  maid  to  Mistress  Rose, 
daughter  of  Sir  Roger  Oatley,  Lord  Mayor  of  London, 
in  Dekker's  Shoemaker's  Holiday,  and  of  how  when 
Sybil  goes  to  join  her  mistress,  who  is  staying  with 
friends  at  Old  Ford,  Rose  asks  whether  she  has  seen 
young  Lacy,  the  gallant  she  loves,  but  who  is  cold 
to  her,  and  whether  he  sent  "  kind  greetings  to  his 
love,"  and  the  maid  answers  that  she  had  only  seen 
him  one  day  stalk  past  with  his  soldiers  : 

"  0  yes,  out  of  cry,  by  my  troth.  I  scarce  knew  him  ;  here 
'  a  wore  a  scarf  ;  and  here  a  scarf,  here  a  bunch  of  feathers, 
and  here  precious  stones  and  jewels,  and  a  pair  of  garters — 
O,  monstrous  !  like  one  of  our  yellow  silk  curtains  at  home 
here  in  Old  Ford  House  here,  in  Master  Bellymount's  chamber. 
I  stood  at  our  door  in  Cornhill,  looked  at  him,  he  at  me,  indeed, 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    101 

spake  to  him,  but  he  not  to  me,  not  a  word.  Marry  go-up, 
thought  I,  with  a  wanion  !  He  passed  by  me  as  proud — Marry, 
foh  !  you  are  grown  humorous,  thought  I ;  and  so  shut  the 
door,  and  in  I  came." 

You  can  see  the  piquant  face  of  the  peering  girl 
suddenly  withdrawn  as  the  disdainful  lordling  goes 
swaggering  by,  and  it  is  the  crisp  snap  of  that  door 
slamming  that  shatters  our  dream  and  wakes  us 
to  the  fact  that  Sir  Roger  Oatley's  shop  is  no  longer 
visible  on  Comhill. 

"  The  '  Banks  of  Jordan  '  was  a  public-house  in 
the  city,  which  from  its  appearance  did  not  seem  to 
do  a  very  thriving  trade,"  writes  Anthony  Trollope, 
in  The  Three  Clerks.  "  You  enter  the  *  Banks  of 
Jordan  '  by  two  folding  doors  in  a  corner  of  a  very 
narrow  alley  behind  the  Exchange ;  "  and  thither 
came  Charley  Tudor  to  keep  an  appointment  with 
Mr.  M'Ruen.  The  narrow  alley  is  there  yet,  con- 
necting the  open  space  at  the  back  of  the 
Exchange  with  Finch  Lane  ;  there  is  still  a  restaurant 
there,  and  moreover  you  enter  it  by  two  folding 
doors,  but  its  name  is  nothing  like  "  The  Banks  of 
Jordan."  It  is  probably  a  legitimate  successor  to 
the  one  that  Trollope  knew  ;  for  where  a  public- 
house  is  pulled  down  in  London,  a  new  one  generally 
rises  from  the  ashes  of  the  old. 

Before  we  proceed  up  Comhill :  here,  beside  the 
Exchange,  the  pillory  used  to  stand,  and  in  the 
summer  of  1703  Defoe  stood  in  it,  us  pimishmcnt 
for  having  published  his  "  Shortest  Way  with  the 
Dissenters,"  but  he  was  so  popular  with  the  mob 
that  instead  of  pelting  him  with  mud  and  dead  cats 
they  swarmed  round  to  applaud  and  protect  him  from 


102  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

insult  and  injury.  He  was  at  that  time  living 
farther  up  Cornhill,  in  Freeman's  Court,  where  he 
carried  on  business  as  a  hosier  ;  and  rather  more 
than  a  century  later  the  famous  letter  from  Messrs. 
Dodson  and  Fogg,  announcing  that  they  had  been 
instructed  by  Mrs.  Martha  Bardell  to  commence  an 
action  for  breach  of  promise  of  marriage  against 
Mr.  Samuel  Pickwick,  was  dated  from  their  offices, 
"  Freeman's  Court,  Cornhill,  August  28th,  1827."  And 
you  may  picture  Mr.  Pickwick,  with  that  letter  in  his 
pocket,  striding  indignantly  up  Cornhill,  with  Sam 
Weller,  to  that  furious  interview  with  Messrs.  Dodson 
and  Fogg  which  ended  in  Sam's  desperately  intervening 
and,  without  ceremony,  hauling  his  master  down 
the  stairs,  and  down  the  court,  "  and  having  safely 
deposited  him  in  Cornhill,  fell  behind,  prepared  to 
follow  whithersoever  he  should  lead.  Mr.  Pickwick 
walked  on  abstractedly,  crossed  opposite  the  Mansion 
House,  and  bent  his  steps  up  Cheapside  ;  "  on  his 
road  to  Gray's  Inn  to  see  his  own  lawyer,  Mr.  Perker. 
I  am  sorry  that  Freeman's  Court  was  demolished 
over  sixty  years  ago,  but  I  have  a  conviction  that 
if  you  explore  Newman's  Court  you  will  see  almost 
exactly  what  it  looked  like. 

In  Birchin  Lane  Macaulay  lived  when  he  was  a 
child  ;  and  the  poet  Gray  was  born  in  a  house  that 
stood  two  doors  this  side  of  St.  Michael's  Alley.  A 
little  beyond  the  Alley,  is  St.  Peter's  Church,  said 
to  be  the  oldest  Christian  Church  in  London.  It 
was  founded,  according  to  the  inscription  on  an 
ancient  tablet  preserved  in  the  vestry,  in  the  year 
One  hundred  and  ninety-seven.  You  must  come 
here  of  an  evening,  when,  as  Henry  S.  Leigh  has  it, 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    103 

Temples  of  Mammon  are  voiceless  again — 
Lonely  policemen  inherit  Mark  Lane  ; 
Silent  is  Lothbury — quiet  Cornhill — 
Babel  of  Commerce,  thine  echoes  are  still ; 

if  you  would  see  the  street  as  Bradley  Headstone 
and  Charley  and  Lizzie  Hexam  saw  it  on  the 
occasion  of  their  meeting  when  Lizzie  was  return- 
ing from  one  of  her  business  visits  to  the  gentle 
Jew,  Riah,  at  the  premises  of  Messrs.  Pubsey  and  Co., 
in  St.  Mary  Axe,  Leadenhall  Street.  Her  brother  and 
Bradley  Headstone  lingered  waiting  for  her  here  in 
Gracechurch  Street,  where  Cornhill  ends  and  Leaden- 
hall Street  begins.  In  Gracechurch  Street  is  one 
entrance  to  St.  Peter's  Alley,  which  makes  two  sides  of 
a  square  round  the  walled-in  churchyard  at  the  back 
of  the  Church  and  comes  out  again  into  Cornhill ; 
and  in  this  same  St.  Peter's  Alley  was  enacted  one  of 
the  most  memorable  scenes  of  Our  Mutual  Friend  : 

"  A  grey  dusty  withered  evening  in  London  city  has  not  a 
hopeful  aspect.  The  closed  warehouses  and  offices  have  an 
air  of  death  about  them,  and  the  national  dread  of  colour  has 
an  air  of  mourning.  The  towers  and  steeples  of  the  many 
house-encompassed  churches,  dark  and  dingy  as  the  sky  that 
seems  descending  on  them,  are  no  relief  to  the  general  gloom. 
...  On  such  an  evening,  when  the  City  grit  gets  into  the 
hair  and  eyes  and  skin,  and  when  the  fallen  leaves  of  the  few 
unhappy  City  trees  grind  down  in  corners  under  wheels  of  wind, 
the  schoolmaster  and  the  pupil  emerged  upon  the  Leadenhall 
Street  region,  spying  eastward  for  Lizzie.  Being  something 
too  soon  in  their  arrival,  they  lurked  at  a  corner,  waiting  for 
her  to  appear.  The  best-looking  among  us  will  not  look  well 
lurking  at  a  corner,  and  Bradley  came  out  of  tiiat  disadvantage 
very  poorly  indeed. 

"  '  Here  she  comes,  Mr.  Headstone  !  Let  us  go  forward 
and  meet  her.' 


104  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  As  they  advanced  she  saw  them  coming,  and  seemed 
rather  troubled.  But  she  greeted  her  brother  with  the  usual 
warmth,  and  touched  the  extended  hand  of  Bradley, 

"  '  Why,  where  are  you  going,  Charley,  dear  ?  '  she  asked 
him  then. 

"  '  Nowhere.    We  came  on  purpose  to  meet  you.' 

"  '  To  meet  me,  Charley  ?  ' 

"  '  Yes.  We  are  going  to  walk  with  you.  But  don't  let 
us  take  the  great  leading  streets  where  everyone  walks,  and 
we  can't  hear  ourselves  speak.  Let  us  go  by  the  quiet  back- 
ways.  Here's  a  large  paved  court  by  this  church,  and  quiet, 
too.     Let  us  go  up  here.' 

"  '  But  it's  not  in  the  way,  Charley.' 

"  '  Yes  it  is,'  said  the  boy,  petulantly.  '  It's  in  my  way, 
and  my  way  is  yours.' 

"  She  had  not  released  his  hand,  and,  still  holding  it,  looked 
at  him  with  a  kind  of  appeal.  He  avoided  her  eyes  under 
pretence  of  saying,  '  Come  along,  Mr.  Headstone.'  Bradley 
walked  at  his  side — not  at  hers — and  the  brother  and  sister 
walked  hand  in  hand.  The  court  brought  them  to  a  church- 
yard ;  a  paved  square  court,  with  a  raised  bank  of  earth  about 
breast-high,  in  the  middle,  enclosed  by  iron  rails.  Here,  con- 
veniently and  healthfully  elevated  above  the  level  of  the 
living,  were  the  dead,  and  the  tombstones ;  some  of  the 
latter  droopingly  inclined  from  the  perpendicular,  as  if  they 
were  ashamed  of  the  lies  they  told.  They  paced  the  whole  of 
this  place  once,  in  a  constrained  and  uncomfortable  manner, 
when  the  boy  stopped  and  said  : 

"  '  Lizzie,  Mr.  Headstone  has  something  to  say  to  you.'  " 

In  spite  of  her  appeal,  he  breaks  away  and  leaves 
her  alone  with  the  schoolmaster,  and  hesitantly, 
apologetically,  tumultuously  Bradley  Headstone  tries 
to  give  utterance  to  his  passion  for  her,  and  tells  how 
his  love  for  her  and  her  dislike  of  him  is  ruining  all 
his  life. 

"  Struggling  with  himself,  and  by  times  looking  up  at  the 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    105 

deserted  windows  of  the  houses  as  if  there  could  be  any- 
thing written  in  their  grimy  panes  that  would  help  him, 
he  paced  the  whole  pavement  at  her  side,  before  he  spoke 
again. 

"  '  I  must  try  to  give  expression  to  what  is  in  my  mind ;  it 
shall  and  must  be  spoken.  Though  you  see  me  so  confounded 
— though  you  strike  me  so  helpless — I  ask  you  to  believe  that 
there  are  many  people  who  think  well  of  me  ;  that  there  are 
some  people  who  highly  esteem  me  ;  that  I  have  in  my  way 
won  a  station  which  is  considered  worth  winning.' 

"  '  Surely,  Mr.  Headstone,  I  do  believe  it.  Surely  I  have 
always  known  it  from  Charley.' 

"  '  I  ask  you  to  believe  that  if  I  were  to  offer  my  home  such 
as  it  is,  my  station  such  as  it  is,  my  affections  such  as  they  are, 
to  any  one  of  the  best  considered  and  best  qualified  and  most 
distinguished  among  the  young  women  engaged  in  my  calling, 
they  would  probably  be  accepted.  Even  readily  accepted. 
...  I  have  sometimes  had  it  in  my  thoughts  to  make  that 
offer  and  to  settle  down  as  many  men  of  my  class  do  :  I  on 
the  one  side  of  the  school,  my  wife  on  the  other,  both  of  us 
interested  in  the  same  work.' 

"  '  Why  have  you  not  done  so  ?  '  asked  Lizzie.  '  Why  do 
you  not  do  so  ?  ' 

"  '  Far  better  that  I  never  did  !  The  only  one  grain  of 
comfort  I  have  had  these  many  weeks,'  he  said,  always  speak- 
ing passionately  and,  when  most  emphatic,  repeating  that 
former  action  of  his  hands,  which  was  like  flinging  his  heart's 
blood  down  before  her  in  drops  upon  the  pavement-stones  ; 
'  the  only  grain  of  comfort  I  have  had  these  many  weeks  is, 
that  I  never  did.  For  if  I  had,  and  if  the  same  spell  had  come 
upon  me  for  my  ruin,  I  know  I  should  have  broken  that  tic 
asunder  as  if  it  had  Ijccn  thread.' 

"  She  glanced  at  him  with  a  glance  of  fcar^  and  a  shrinking 
gesture.     He  answered,  as  if  she  had  spoken. 

"  '  No  !  It  would  not  have  l)een  voluntary  on  my  part,  any 
more  than  it  is  voluntary  in  me  to  bo  here  now.  You  draw 
me  to  you.  If  I  were  shut  up  in  a  strong  prison,  you  would 
draw  mc  out.     I  should  break  through  the  wall  to  come  to  you. 


106  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

If  I  were  lying  on  a  sick  bed,  you  would  draw  me  up — to  stagger 
to  your  feet  and  fall  there.' 

"  The  wild  energy  of  the  man,  now  quite  let  loose,  was 
absolutely  terrible.  He  stooped  and  laid  his  hand  upon  a 
piece  of  the  coping  of  the  burial-ground  enclosure,  as  if  he  would 
have  dislodged  the  stone. 

"  '  No  man  knows  till  the  time  comes,  what  depths  are 
within  him.  To  some  men  it  never  comes  ;  let  them  rest 
and  be  thankful  !  To  me,  you  brought  it ;  on  me,  you  forced 
it ;  and  the  bottom  of  this  raging  sea,'  striking  himself  upon  the 
breast,  '  has  been  heaved  up  ever  since.' 

"  '  Mr.  Headstone,  I  have  heard  enough.  Let  me  stop  you 
here.  It  will  be  better  for  you  and  better  for  me.  Let  us  find 
my  brother.' 

"  '  Not  yet.  It  shall  and  must  be  spoken.  .  .  ,  Here  is  a 
man  lighting  the  lamps.  He  will  be  gone  directly.  I  entreat 
of  you  to  let  us  walk  round  this  place  again.  You  have  no 
reason  to  look  alarmed  ;  I  can  restrain  myself,  and  I  will.' 

"  She  yielded  to  the  entreaty — how  could  she  do  otherwise  ? 
— and  they  paced  the  stones  in  silence.  One  by  one  the  lights 
leaped  up,  making  the  cold  grey  church  tower  more  remote, 
and  then  they  were  alone  again.  He  said  no  more  until  they 
had  regained  the  spot  where  he  had  broken  off  ;  there,  he 
again  stood  still,  and  again  grasped  the  stone.  In  saying  what 
he  said  then,  he  never  looked  at  her  ;  but  looked  at  it  and 
wrenched  at  it. 

"  '  You  know  what  I  am  going  to  say.  I  love  you.  What 
other  men  may  mean  when  they  use  that  expression,  I  cannot 
tell ;  what  /  mean  is,  that  I  am  under  the  influence  of  some 
tremendous  attraction  which  I  have  resisted  in  vain,  and 
which  overmasters  me.  You  could  draw  me  to  fire,  you  could 
draw  me  to  water,  you  could  draw  me  to  the  gallows,  you 
could  draw  me  to  any  death,  you  could  draw  me  to  anything 
I  have  most  avoided,  you  could  draw  me  to  any  exposure  and 
disgrace  .  .  .  you  could  draw  me  to  any  good — every  good 
— with  equal  force.  ...  I  only  add  that  if  it  is  any  claim 
on  you  to  be  in  earnest,  I  am  in  thorough  earnest,  dreadful 
earnest.'  " 


ivm.  pick:\vick,  lizzie  hexam,  etc.  107 

She  tells  him  as  gently  as  may  be  that  she  has  no 
love  for  him,  and  that  there  is  no  hope  of  any  change 
coming  over  her  feelings  towards  him. 

"  '  Then/  said  he,  suddenly  changing  his  tone  and  turning 
to  her,  and  bringing  his  clenched  hand  down  upon  the  stone 
with  a  force  that  laid  the  knuckles  raw  and  bleeding  ;  '  then 
I  hope  that  I  may  never  kill  him  ! '  The  dark  look  of  hatred 
and  revenge  with  which  the  words  broke  from  his  li\id  lips,  and 
with  which  he  stood  holding  out  his  smeared  hand  as  if  it  held 
some  weapon  and  had  just  struck  a  mortal  blow,  made  her  so 
afraid  of  him  that  she  turned  to  run  away.  But  he  caught 
her  by  the  arm. 

"  '  Mr.  Headstone,  let  me  go.  Mr.  Headstone,  1  must  call 
for  help  ! ' 

"  '  It  is  I  who  should  call  for  help,'  he  said ;  '  you  don't 
know  yet  how  much  I  need  it.'  " 

He  controls  himself,  and  she  listens  whilst  he 
bares  his  heart  and  discloses  his  consuming  jealousy 
of  the  genial,  careless,  shiftless  Eugene  Wrayburn, 
the  dilletante  barrister  who  has  been  paying  her  so 
much  attention  of  late,  and  whilst  she  is  trying  to 
check  or  answer  his  wild  talk,  her  brother  saunters 
into  view  and  she  runs  to  him.  Then  Bradley 
Headstone  gives  in,  and  goes,  saying  enough  to  let 
his  pupU  know  he  has  been  rejected.  Follows 
another  scene  in  which  Charley  Hexam  bullies  and 
abuses  his  sister,  and  since  she  will  not  yield  to  his 
entreaties  and  insistence  that  she  should  study  his 
interests,  as  she  always  has  done  before,  and  marry 
the  schoolmaster,  he  renounces  her  for  ever,  in  a 
blind  fury,  and  lcav(;s  her  in  the  gloomy  Alley  alone. 
As  she  stands  there,  with  her  face  laid  in  her  hands 
on  the  stone  coping,  Riali,  the  Jew,  passes,  speaks 
to  her,  recognises  her  and  hearing  what  has  happened. 


108  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

comforts  her  and  sets  out  to  walk  home  with  her, 
but  as  they  emerge  into  the  main  thoroughfare, 
they  come  upon  Eugene  Wrayburn,  "  loitering  dis- 
contentedly by,  and  looking  up  the  street,  and  down 
it,  and  all  about."  He  had  come  to  walk  home  with 
her,  "  having  dined  at  a  coffee-house  in  this  neigh- 
bourhood and  knowing  your  hour ;  "  and  though 
both  Lizzie  and  old  Riah  discourage  him  from  doing 
so,  he  gaily  accompanies  them  as  far  as  to  Lizzie's 
lodgings,  near  Smith  Square,  Westminster. 

Haunted  by  the  memory  of  that  tensely  dramatic 
scene,  and  by  those  five  human  figures,  so  vividly 
alive,  though  they  never  really  lived,  St.  Peter's 
Alley  is  to  me  one  of  the  most  glamorous  spots  in 
London.  Its  churchyard  wall,  and  some  of  its  houses 
have  been  rebuilt  or  restored,  but  you  feel  still,  if 
you  pass  round  it  after  the  lamps  are  lighted,  that 
it  is  the  exactly  right  setting  for  the  poignant  in- 
cident that  Dickens  placed  there. 

We  will  not  go  into  Leadenhall  Street ;  there  is 
nothing  there  now  that  we  need  go  out  of  our  way 
to  see.  When  I  was  a  boy  (it  is  strange  that  I  am 
not  yet  used  to  the  feeling  that  I  am  old  enough  to 
talk  in  this  fashion)  only  a  few  doors  up  on  the  left 
of  Leadenhall  Street  was  a  nautical  instrument- 
maker's  shop  ;  a  squat,  old-fashioned  shop,  its  small- 
paned  windows  full  of  glitteringly  bright  brass  and 
glass  articles  connected  with  the  seafaring  life ; 
and  projecting  from  the  doorpost,  just  above  reach 
of  one's  head,  was  the  painted  wooden  figure  of  a 
little  midshipman  who  was  for  ever  examining  the 
opposite  side  of  the  road  through  what  I  believe 
is    technically    known    as    a    sextant.      I    had    read 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    109 

Dombey  and  Son,  and  knew  this  was  the  shop  of 
old  Sol  Gills,  and  I  could  never  get  by  it  without 
stopping  to  peer  in  at  the  bewildering  collection  of 
unfamiliar  objects  on  show  in  the  window.  I  often 
thought  of  making  an  excuse  to  go  in,  but  never 
had  the  courage  to  do  it.  So  far  as  I  could  see, 
glancing  in  at  the  door,  the  interior  was  precisely 
as  Dickens  describes  it,  and  when  you  remember 
that  not  merely  Sol  Gills,  but  Captain  Cuttle,  and 
that  remarkable  person  Captain  Bunsby,  Mr.  Toots 
and  the  Game  Chicken,  Walter  Gay,  Florence 
Dombey,  Susan  Nipper,  Rob  the  Grinder,  and 
Brogley  (the  second-hand  furniture  dealer,  of  Bishops- 
gate  Street  Without,  who  was  put  in  as  a  man-in- 
possession)  all  came  and  went  to  and  from  that  shop, 
and  several  of  them  lived,  from  time  to  time,  in  the 
rooms  over  it,  you  may  guess  what  a  place  of  magic 
it  was  to  me,  and  what  a  sacrilege  it  seemed  to  pull 
such  a  house  down  and  rear  a  common,  inglorious 
building  in  its  place.  I  once  made  a  special  journey 
round  to  the  Minories  to  see  the  little  wooden  mid- 
shipman outside  the  new  shop  there  to  which  he 
had  been  transferred,  but  he  looked  so  lost  and 
desolate,  so  shorn  of  his  happy  past  that  I  took  no 
pleasure  in  seeing  him  ;  and  now  he  is  gone  from 
there  also,  and  I  have  lost  track  of  him. 

And  it  is  no  use  going  as  far  up  Leadenhall 
Street  as  St.  Mary  Axe  to  discover  the  house  in 
which  Fascinating  Flcdgby  carried  on  his  money- 
lending  business  with  that  idyllic  old  Jew  Riah 
to  manage  it,  for  with  the  exception  of  some 
half  dozen  houses  at  the  Houndsditch  end  of 
the     street    all     St.     Mary     Axe     is     new.       There 


110  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

was  a  day  when  Sir  Barnes  Newcome,  having 
got  through  with  certain  business  at  his  bank  in 
Threadneedle  Street,  "  had  occasion  to  go  on  'Change, 
or  elsewhere,  to  confer  with  brother  capitahsts,  and 
in  Comhill  behold  he  meets  his  uncle,  Colonel  New- 
come,  riding  towards  the  India  House,  a  groom 
behind  him."  But  the  India  House,  where  Charles 
Lamb  was  a  clerk,  is  no  longer  left  in  Leadenhall 
Street ;  the  East  India  Chambers  on  the  right  of  the 
street  occupy  the  site  of  it. 

It  is  worth  while,  however,  taking  a  stroll  through 
LeadenhaU  Market,  which  you  may  enter  either 
from  Leadenhall  or  from  Gracechurch  Street,  for 
here  Tim  Linkinwater,  the  Cheeryble  Brothers' 
managing  clerk,  used  to  do  his  shopping,  and  boasted 
that  he  could  "  buy  new-laid  eggs  in  Leadenhall 
Market  any  morning  before  breakfast  ;  "  and  it  was 
to  the  Blue  Boar  tavern  (which  you  will  search  for 
in  vain)  in  Leadenhall  Market  that  Sam  Weller 
went  to  keep  an  appointment  with  his  father,  and 
in  the  parlour  of  that  hostelry  he  wrote  the  valentine 
to  Mary,  the  housemaid,  of  which  the  elder  Weller 
so  profoundly  disapproved,  and  there  again  that  Sam 
vainly  poured  cold  water  on  his  father's  suggestion 
that  he  should  bring  forward  friends  of  his  own 
at  the  trial  of  "  Bardell  v.  Pickwick "  in  order  to 
"  prove  a  alleybi,"  and  win  the  case. 

Early  in  the  fifteenth  century,  Sir  Symon  Eyre,  a 
draper,  and  Lord  Mayor  of  London,  built  at  his  own 
expense  at  the  corner  of  Leadenhall  and  Gracechurch 
Streets,  a  hall  that  was  to  be  used  "  as  a  public 
granary  for  laying  up  corn  against  a  time  of 
scarcity."     Dekker,  over  a  century  afterwards,  used 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    Ill 

the  fact  in  his  comedy,  The  Shoemaker's  Holiday  : 
he  makes  Simon  Eyre  an  eccentric  shoemaker,  Hving 
in  Tower  Street,  and  after  he  becomes  Lord  Mayor 
he  builds  the  hall  and  entertains  the  Kmg  and  a 
great  company  including  his  own  workpeople. 
"  Let's  march  together,"  says  Firk,  one  of  his  men, 
to  the  others,  "  for  the  honour  of  St.  Hugh  to  the 
great  new  Hall  in  Gracious  Street  comer,  which 
our  master,  the  new  Lord  Mayor,  hath  built  ;  "  and 
after  the  banquet,  the  King  greets  him  with, 

Nay,  my  mad  Lord  Mayor,  that  shall  be  thy  name  ; 

If  any  grace  of  mine  can  length  thy  life, 

One  honour  more  I'll  do  thee  :  that  new  building. 

Which  at  thy  cost  in  Cornhill  is  erected, 

Shall  take  a  name  from  us — we'll  have  it  called 

The  Leadenhall,  because  in  digging  it 

You  found  the  lead  that  covereth  the  same. 

Who  cares  how  much  of  that  is  true  ?  I  like  this 
comer  of  Leadenhall  Street  because  of  its  associa- 
tion with  Dekker  and  his  characters  ;  because  his 
imagination  played  about  it,  and  he  saw  it  in  his 
fancy  with  all  his  characters  thronging  along  these 
streets  and  filtering  into  the  new  hall  that  grew  old 
and  passed  away,  yet  is  still  here  in  its  place,  one 
of  those  imperishable  dream-houses  of  London  that 
our  writers  of  books  have  built  for  us  and  tenanted 
with  dream-people. 

Nowhere  is  the  spirit  of  Dickens  so  all-pervading 
as  it  is  hereabouts  in  the  very  heart  of  the  City. 
He  tells  you,  in  his  little  sketch,  "  Bill-Sticking," 
it  was  when  he  was  "  on  Cornhill,  near  the  Royal 
Exchange,"  that  he  saw  a  solemn  procession  of 
three    advertising  vans,    and    looking    into    one    of 


112  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  vans,  whilst  the  driver  was  refreshing  himself 
in  a  public-house,  he  saw  and  held  converse  with 
"  the  King  of  the  Bni-Stickers."  Go  round,  and  up 
the  next  turning,  and  Dickens  has  been  there  before 
you  how  many  times  and  in  what  tumults  of  emotion  ! 
For  at  No.  2  Lombard  Street  was  the  banking  estab- 
lishment of  Mr.  George  Beadnell,  and  whilst  he  was 
still  in  his  teens  Dickens  fell  madly  in  love  with  the 
banker's  daughter,  Maria.  She  was  pretty,  and  a 
good  deal  of  a  coquette,  and  her  father  objected 
to  her  suitor,  than  a  very  young  man  of  no  means 
and  no  position.  He  used  to  get  his  friend,  Henry 
Kolle,  in  love  with  one  of  Maria's  sisters,  to  smuggle 
letters  into  the  house  for  him  ;  he  haunted  the  street 
in  agonies  of  despair,  seeking  to  see  her,  and  later 
told  Forster  how  his  love  for  Maria  Beadnell  for 
four  years  excluded  every  other  idea  from  his  mind, 
and  inspired  him  to  work  with  a  fierce  determina- 
tion that  "  lifted  me  up  into  newspaper  life  and 
floated  me  away  over  a  hundred  men's  heads."  The 
romance  ended  ;  Maria  married  a  Mr.  Winter,  and 
Dickens  saw  no  more  of  her  for  five-and-twenty 
years.  Meanwhile,  he  had  idealised  her  into  the 
Dora  of  David  Copperfield  ;  but  when  he  met  her 
again,  she  was  so  changed  and  he  so  disillusioned 
that  she  served  him  as  a  model  also  for  Flora 
Finching,  of  Little  Dorrit. 

Plough  Court,  Lombard  Street,  in  which  Alexander 
Pope  was  bom,  has  lost  every  vestige  of  antiquity  ; 
but  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  road  is  George  Yard, 
and  up  George  Yard  was  the  George  and  Vulture 
Tavern  and  Hotel,  where,  after  Mrs.  Bardell  com- 
menced her  action  against  him,  Mr.  Pickwick  went 


-fif 

!|S?    ^    Ksf 


M.: 


_    3 


~      ^    ••        ../  DePTFORD 

fred'-Adcock 

Kvchn  /ifui  a  sitting'  hi  St.  Xic/iolns  C/iurc/i,  Dcpi/ord,  and  Marlmw  is  Iniried  in 

tlic  churclivard.      lUsant  foundid  "  The  World  Went  Very   Hell  Tlten'  on  lite 

CItrouiclcs  o/  J)ept/ord,  and  on  a  tombstone  in  the  Church  of  St.  Xicliolas. 

I  lia/tter  8 


MR.  PICKWICK,  LIZZIE  HEXAM,  ETC.    lia 

to  stay,  with  Sam  Weller.  And  it  not  only  was 
there,  but  you  will  find  it  there  still,  at  the  top  of 
the  yard,  crushed  in  and  elbowed  almost  out  of  sight 
by  new  buildings,  at  the  corner  of  Bengal  Court  and 
St.  Michael's  Alley.  A  rambling,  two-century  old 
place  it  is,  with  a  few  old  houses  surviving  beside 
it  to  keep  it  company,  and  a  bygone,  out-of-date 
atmosphere  folding  about  them  all  that  takes  you 
back  into  the  past  whenever  you  breathe  it.  Mr 
Pickwick  was  lodging  at  the  George  and  Vulture 
when  Mr.  Jackson  came  round  from  Messrs.  Dodson 
and  Fogg's  to  serve  subpoenas  on  Mr.  Tupman  and 
Mr.  Snodgrass  who  were  visiting  him  there  ;  Sam 
Weller  used  to  take  his  dinner  in  the  back  room, 
and  was  summoned  thence  by  a  messenger  to  that 
meeting  with  his  father  in  Leadenhall  Market ;  Mr. 
Perker  called  there  more  than  once  to  see  Mr.  Pick- 
wick about  his  case.  Returning  from  Bath,  Mr. 
Pickwick,  "  attended,  of  course,  by  Sam,  straight- 
way repaired  to  his  old  quarters  at  the  George  and 
Vulture,"  and  "  on  the  third  morning  after  their 
arrival,  just  as  all  the  clocks  in  the  city  were  striking 
nine  individually,  and  somewhere  about  nine  hundred 
collectively,  Sam  was  taking  the  air  in  George  Yard, 
when  a  queer  sort  of  fresh  painted  vehicle  drove 
up,  out  of  which  there  jumped,  with  great  agility, 
throwing  the  reins  to  a  stout  man  who  sat  beside 
him,  a  (lucer  sort  of  gentleman  who  seemed  made 
for  the  vehicle,  and  the  vehicle  for  him."  These 
were  Mr.  Namby  and  Mr.  Smouch,  of  Bell  Alley, 
Coleman  Street,  come  to  arrest  Mr.  Pickwick  on  a 
warrant  for  not  paying  the  damages  and  costs  awarded 
to  Mrs.  Bardell,  and,  as  we  have  mentioned  already, 
8 


114  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

they  carried  him  off  with  them.  It  was  to  the 
George  and  Vulture  that  Mr.  Pickwick  returned 
after  his  happy  release  from  the  Fleet  Prison  ;  and 
there  that  old  Tony  Weller  came  to  him  and  would 
have  endowed  him  with  all  his  own  savings,  believ- 
ing it  was  poverty  and  not  obstinacy  that  had  made 
him  submit  to  his  imprisonment  ;  it  was  at  the 
George  and  Vulture  that  Mr.  Winkle  stayed  after 
his  marriage  with  Arabella  Allen  ;  and  it  was  Mary, 
the  pretty  housemaid  there,  who  won  the  heart  of 
Sam  Weller  and  married  him  at  last.  Yet  no  hint 
of  its  Pickwickian  connections  glorifies  the  outer 
walls  of  the  tavern,  and  there  is  no  intimation  at 
the  entrance  to  George  Yard  that  the  George  and 
Vulture  may  be  discovered  with  difficulty  in  the 
depths  of  it. 

Defoe's  Colonel  Jack  committed  one  of  his  many 
thefts  at  the  Gracechurch  end  of  Lombard  Street  : 
he  knocked  down  and  robbed  a  woollen  draper's 
apprentice,  who  was  returning  from  a  goldsmith's 
in  Lombard  Street  to  his  master's  shop  in  Grace- 
church  Street.  Master  Heriot,  the  goldsmith,  of 
The  Fortunes  of  Nigel,  had  his  home  in  Lombard 
Street,  and  some  of  the  great  scenes  of  the  novel 
were  enacted  under  his  roof.  And  Falstaff  used 
to  come  occasionally  to  Lombard  Street,  for  does 
not  Mistress  Quickly  tell  the  Sheriffs  officers.  Fang 
and  Snare,  whilst  they  are  lurking  in  Smithfield 
ready  to  arrest  Sir  John  if  he  comes  there,  that,  if 
he  does  not  arrive,  "  he's  indited  to  dinner  to  the 
Lubber's  Head  in  Lumbert  Street,  to  Master 
Smooth's,  the  silkman  "  ? 


CHAPTER  VI 

TO   THE   TOWER 

SOME  of  the  scenes  of  Heywood's  comedy,  The 
Wise-Woman  of  Hogsdon,  are  laid  in  Gracechiirch 
Street,  and  one  of  his  characters.  Sir  Harry,  whom 
he  did  not  trouble  to  furnish  with  a  surname,  had 
his  house  here,  and  Sencer  came  to  it,  for  the  pur- 
poses of  the  plot,  to  lure  Sir  Harry's  daughter  away 
with  a  delightfully  plausible  bait  : 

There  is  a  cunning  woman  dwells  not  far^ 
At  Hogsdon,  lady,  famous  for  her  skill. 
Besides  some  private  talk  that  much  concerns 
Your  fortunes  in  your  love,  she  hath  to  show  you. 
This  night,  if  it  shall  please  you  walk  so  far 
As  to  her  house,  an  admirable  suit 
Of  costly  needlework,  which  if  you  please 
You  may  buy  under-rate  for  half  the  value 
It  cost  the  making  ;  about  six  o'clock 
You  may  have  view  thereof,  but  otherwise, 
A  lady  that  hath  craved  the  sight  thereof 
Must  have  the  first  refusal. 

What  woman  could  resist  such  a  cunningly  blended 
temptation  ?  If  it  were  not  enough  that  she  might, 
by  means  of  the  Wise-Woman's  magic  learn,  some- 
thing about  hor  lover  ;  there  was  the  getting  of  that 
bargain,  which  might  be  snatched  from  her  by  an- 
other woman  if  she  failed  to  arrive  in  time,  and 
that   in   itself   was   irresistible.     But,    after   all,   my 

116 


116  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

chief  interest  in  Gracechurch  Street  gathers  about 
certain  people  who  really  existed.  In  1830,  William 
Hone,  best  remembered  for  his  Every-Day  Book, 
and  his  Table-Book,  opened  the  Grasshopper  coffee- 
house here,  at  No.  13.  Hone  had  fallen  on  evil 
days  ;  his  friends  rallied  round  to  set  him  up  in 
business,  and  Lamb — you  never  come  across  Lamb 
doing  anything  that  is  not  friendly  and  generous 
— took  an  active  part  in  raising  subscriptions  to  help 
him.  Before  the  shop  could  be  opened,  when  it 
was  only  half  fitted  up.  Lamb  sat  in  it  writing  to 
Southey  for  assistance  and  explaining  Hone's  cir- 
cumstances :  "  He  is  just  now  in  a  critical  situation  ; 
kind  friends  have  opened  a  coffee-house  for  him  in 
the  City,  but  their  means  have  not  extended  to  the 
purchase  of  coffee-pots,  credit  for  Reviews,  news- 
papers, and  other  paraphernalia.  So  I  am  sitting 
in  the  skeleton  of  a  possible  Divan.  .  .  .  Those 
'  Every-day '  and  *  Table-Books  '  will  be  a  treasure 
a  hundred  years  hence,  but  they  have  failed  to  make 
Hone's  fortune."  Over  a  hundred  pounds  was 
raised.  Lamb  starting  the  subscription  with  ten, 
and  Hone  kept  the  Grasshopper  for  three  years, 
editing  his  Year  Book  from  it,  and  filling  his  leisure 
with  other  literary  and  journalistic  labours. 

Continuing  out  of  Gracechurch  into  Bishopsgate 
Street,  we  follow,  thereafter,  much  of  the  route 
defined  by  Iniquity,  when  Satan,  the  Great  DevU, 
summoned  him  up  for  the  guidance  of  Pug,  the 
Little  Devil,  in  The  Devil  is  an  Ass  : 

Child  of  hell,  this  is  nothing  !    I  will  fetch  thee  a  leap 
From  the  top  of  Paul's  steeple  to  the  standard  in  Cheap  : 
And  lead  thee  a  dance  through  the  streets  without  fail, 


TO  THE  TOWER  117 

Like  a  needle  of  Spain,  with  a  thread  at  my  tail, 

We  will  survey  the  suburbs  and  make  forth  our  saUies 

Down  Petticoat  Lane  .   .   . 

To  Shoreditch,  Whitechapel,  and  so  to  St.  Kathern's, 

To  drink  with  the  Dutch  there  and  take  forth  our  patterns. 

Until  five  years  ago,  Crosby  Hall  occupied  the  right- 
hand  side  of  Great  Saint  Helens,  with  its  front  on 
Bishopsgate  Street  ;  and  had  its  place  both  in  the 
worlds  of  fact  and  of  imagination.  When  its  builder 
and  first  tenant,  the  grocer-alderman.  Sir  Thomas 
Crosby  died,  it  was  sold  to  Richard,  Duke  of  Glou- 
cester, and  he  made  it  his  palace  after  he  was  crowned 
Richard  IH.  As  such  it  appears  in  Shakespeare's 
drama  of  that  King.  In  the  second  scene  of  the 
first  act,  you  have  Richard  stopping  the  bier  of 
Henry  VI.  in  the  street  and  beside  it  making  violent 
love  to  Anne,  the  widow  of  the  late  King's  murdered 
son,  urging  her,  at  length,  to  "  repair  to  Crosby 
Place,"  and  when  he  has  buried  "  this  noble  King  " 
and  wet  his  grave  with  repentant  tears,  he  will  come 
and  see  her  there.  The  next  scene  and  three  others 
— some  of  the  greatest  in  the  tragedy — are  laid  in 
the  Palace  itself.  But  since  the  Palace  is  gone  (it 
has  been  re-erected  at  Chelsea,  where  it  looks  patheti- 
cally forlorn  in  alien  surroundings)  we  are  more 
intimately  concerned  now  with  the  one  scene,  the 
fourth  of  the  fourth  act,  which  is  enacted  in  the 
street  before  the  Palace.  Thither  come  Queen 
Margaret,  widow  of  Henry  VI.,  Queen  Elizabeth, 
widow  ox  Edward  IV.,  and  the  Duchess  of  York, 
mother  of  the  murdered  Edward  IV.,  of  the  murdered 
Clarence,  and  of  Richard  III.,  and  when  Elizabeth 
and    the    Duchess,    mourning    their    bitler    wrongs. 


118  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

seat  themselves  upon  the  ground  in  despair,  more 
womanly  than  queenly,  Margaret  sinks  down  wearily 
beside  them,  saying  : 

If  ancient  sorrow  be  most  reverend, 

Give  mine  the  benefit  of  seniory, 

And  let  my  griefs  frown  on  the  upper  hand. 

If  sorrow  can  admit  society, 

Tell  o'er  your  woes  again  by  viewing  mine  : 

I  had  an  Edward,  till  a  Richard  killed  him  ; 

I  had  a  Harry,  till  a  Richard  killed  him  : 

Thou  hadst  an  Edward,  till  a  Richard  killed  him  ; 

Thou  hadst  a  Richard,  till  a  Richard  killed  him. 

Duchess.  I  had  a  Richard  too,  and  thou  didst  kill  him  ; 
I  had  a  Rutland  too,  thou  holp'st  to  kill  him. 

Queen  Margaret.  Thou  hadst  a  Clarence  too,  and  Richard 
killed  him. 
From  forth  the  kennel  of  thy  womb  hath  crept 
A  hell-hound  that  doth  hunt  us  all  to  death  : 
That  dog,  that  had  his  teeth  before  his  eyes, 
To  worry  lambs,  and  lap  their  gentle  blood. 
That  foul  defacer  of  God's  handiwork. 
That  excellent  grand  tyrant  of  the  earth. 
That  reigns  in  galled  eyes  of  weeping  souls. 
Thy  womb  let  loose  to  chase  us  to  our  graves, 
O  !  upright,  just,  and  true-disposing  God, 
How  do  I  thank  thee  that  this  carnal  cur 
Preys  on  the  issue  of  his  mother's  body 
And  makes  her  pew-fellow  with  others'  moan. 

Duchess.  0  !  Harry's  wife,  triumph  not  in  my  woes  : 
God  witness  with  me,  I  have  wept  for  thine. 

Queen  Margaret.     Bear  with  me  ;   I  am  hungry  for 
revenge.   .   .   . 

And  by-and-by,  enters  "  King  Richard,  and  his 
Train,  marching,"  to  find  his  path  impeded  by  these 
prostrate  and  distracted  women  ;  and  whilst  he  is 
cunningly    comforting    them     and    subtly    winning 


TO  THE  TOWER  119 

them  to  condone  his  crimes,  messenger  after  mes- 
senger arrives  bringing  him  news  of  the  rising  against 
him  all  over  the  country,  the  beginning  of  the  end 
of  his  power,  till  in  a  momentary  irritation  he  strikes 
one  of  them  with  a  frienzied,  "  Out  on  ye,  owls  ! 
nothing  but  songs  of  death  ?  "  Then  he  learns 
that  this  man's  tidings  are  more  favourable,  and 
presently  the  rascally  Catesby  hurries  in  to  announce  : 

My  liege,  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  is  taken, 
That  is  the  best  news  :  that  the  Earl  of  Richmond 
Is  with  a  mighty  power  landed  at  Milford 
Is  colder  news,  but  yet  they  must  be  told. 

King  Richard.  Away   towards  Salisbury  !   while  we  reason 
here, 
A  royal  battle  might  be  won  and  lost. 
Some  one  take  order  Buckingham  be  brought 
To  Salisbury  ;  the  rest  march  on  with  me. 

And  so,  with  his  soldiery,  he  passes  away  up  the 
street  to  his  death  on  the  Tamworth  battle-field. 
Did  it  all  happen  so  ?  It  happened  so  in  Shake- 
speare's imagination,  and  that  is  enough  for  us,  and 
enough  to  hold  us  dreaming  his  dreams  over  again 
in  this  street  of  Bishopsgate  till  we  lose  sight  of  the 
long  stretch  of  modern  buildings,  and  of  the  buses 
and  carts  and  modem  trafhc  in  the  road,  and  can 
see  the  Palace  back  here  again  with  its  garden,  the 
stately  houses  of  great  merchants,  the  pent-house 
shops,  each  with  its  sign  hanging  out  before  it,  and 
the  frowning  Bishop's  Gate  stretching  across  the 
way  between  Wormwood  Street  and  Camomile 
Street,  and  nearer  to  us  the  quaint  church  of  St. 
Ethclburga,  older  even  than  the  Palace,  and  still 
retaining  its  place,  though  it  is  so  encroached  upon 


120  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  hemmed  in  by  a  huddle  of  little  old  shops  that 
you  may  almost  pass  it  without  being  aware  of  its 
existence. 

Across  the  road,  where  Palmerstone  Buildings 
stand,  was  the  Bull  Inn,  to  which  Hobson,  the  carrier 
used  to  drive  from  Cambridge,  and  in  whose  yard 
Burbage  and  Tarleton  used  to  act  Shakespeare's 
plays.  Not  far  beyond  it  was  the  great  mansion 
of  Sir  Thomas  Gresham,  whose  tomb  is  in  St.  Helen's 
Church,  which  is  down  the  court  here,  immediately 
beside  the  site  of  Crosby  Palace,  and  is  also  older 
than  the  Palace  was.  In  the  church,  too,  are  the 
tombs  of  Sir  John  Crosby,  and  of  the  merchant 
adventurer,  WiUiam  Bond,  who  succeeded  Sir  Thomas 
More,  and  More's  son-in-law,  William  Roper,  as 
tenant  of  Crosby  Hall. 

Monopoly,  in  Webster's  Westward  Ho !  mentions 
that  he  is  going  "  to  sup  to-night  at  the  Lion  in 
Shoreditch  ;  "  and  you  gather  from  other  references 
that  he  is  often  in  that  neighbourhood,  but  we  are 
not  going  there  even  though  Shoreditch  is  rich  in 
literary  associations.  In  Spitalfields,  you  may  dis- 
cover without  difficulty  Sweet  Lilac  Walk,  at  whose 
Common  Lodging  House  Dr.  Luttrel,  in  Besant's 
Bell  of  St.  Paul's,  bought  the  small  boy,  Sammy, 
for  five  pounds  ;  after  he  v/as  gone  Sammy's  old 
grandmother  sent  his  shrewd  little  sister  Sal  to  see 
where  he  was  taken  to,  and  she  chased  the  four- 
wheel  cab  citywards,  and  it  went  "  down  Bishops- 
gate  Street  and  Gracechurch  Street  :  it  turned  west- 
ward to  Cannon  Street  :  at  Queen  Street  it  turned 
again  to  the  south  and  crossed  the  river  by  South- 
wark  Bridge."     It  stopped  at  a  house  on  Bankside, 


TO  THE  TOWER  121 

where  we  shall  arrive  later  on  ;  but  we  are  not  going 
to  Spitalfields.  Shoreditch  and  Spitalfields  lie  in 
the  region  beyond  the  end  of  Bishopsgate  Street 
Without  ;  beyond  Norton  Folgate,  in  w^hich  was 
situated  the  business  premises  of  Messrs.  Quodling 
and  Co.  who  employed  Mr.  Gammon,  of  Gissing's 
Town  Traveller,  and  whence  Mr.  Gammon  had  come 
when  Mr.  Greenacre  overtook  him  in  Threadneedle 
Street.  We  are  not  even  going  so  far  along  Bishops- 
gate  Street  Without  as  to  Middlesex  Street,  which 
is  the  proper  name  of  Petticoat  Lane.  Yet  it  is 
worth  a  visit,  for  since  the  days  of  Elizabeth  it  has 
been  so  much  mentioned  or  described  in  stories, 
sketches  and  plays  ;  but  you  must  visit  it  on  a 
Sunday  morning,  for  every  Sunday  morning  it 
springs  into  phenomenal  life  and  activity  and  an 
overflowing  Jewish  market  rages  from  one  end  to 
the  other  of  it  and  surges  and  roars  in  all  the  adjacent 
streets  until  past  noon.  It  is  Bartholomew  Fair 
on  a  small  scale  :  in  the  matter  of  entertainment 
it  does  not  go  much  beyond  shooting  galleries,  and 
gramophones,  but  toy-stalls,  refreshment  stalls,  and 
stalls  for  the  sale  of  all  manner  of  goods  are  there 
in  bewildering  abundance  and  variety  and  all  the 
shops  put  on  a  holiday  air,  with  the  shopkeepers 
shouting  at  their  doors  as  they  used  to  along  Cheap- 
side  in  the  days  when  Lydgate's  Lackpenny  came 
to  London. 

Our  way  lies  along  Houndsditch,  and  we  ought 
not  to  go  so  far  down  Bishopsgate  Street  as  to  Liver- 
pool Street,  but  it  yawns  so  near,  just  across  the 
road,  that  one  is  tempted  to  stray  aside  into  it  for 
a  minute  to  Liverpool  Street  Station,  because  Gissing 


122  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

has  touched  it  with  romance.  For  a  long  time  Polly 
Sparkes,  of  The  Town  Traveller,  had  been  keeping 
Christopher  Parish  in  suspense.  He  was  employed 
at  a  small  salary  by  Swettenham's,  and  she  knew 
that  as  soon  as  he  got  a  "  rise  "  he  would  ask  her 
to  marry  him,  but  she  was  not  at  all  sure  that  it 
would  be  "  good  enough."  He  had  been  vainly 
trying  to  make  money  by  competing  for  the  dazzling 
prizes  offered  by  a  popular  paper,  and  one  day  she 
has  an  excited  telegram  from  him  : 

"  Great  news.  Do  meet  me  at  entrance  to  Liverpool 
Street  Station  one  o'clock.     Wonderful  news." 

She  assumes  that  he  has  got  his  rise — probably 
another  five  shillings  a  week — and  keeps  the  appoint- 
ment in  an  uncertain  frame  of  mind. 

"  A  little  before  one  o'clock  she  was  at  Liverpool  Street, 
sheltered  from  a  drizzle  that  brought  down  all  the  smoke  of 
myriad  chimneys.  A  slim  figure  in  overcoat  and  shining  hat 
rushed  through  the  puddles  towards  her,  waving  an  umbrella 
to  the  peril  of  other  people,  speeding  only  less  frantically. 

"  '  Polly,  I've  got  it.'  He  could  gasp  no  more  ;  he  seized 
her  arm  as  if  for  support. 

"  '  How  much  is  it  ?  '  she  asked  calmly. 

"  '  Five  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  !    Hyjene  !  ' 

"  '  What — five  hundred  and  fifty  a  year  ?  ' 

"  Christopher  stared  at  her.  '  You  don't  understand. 
The  missing  word.  I've  got  it  this  week.  Cheque  for  five 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds.     Hyjene  1 ' 

"  '  Reely  !  ' 

"  '  Look  here — here's  the  cheque  !    Hyjene  !  ' 

"  Polly  fingered  the  paper,  studied  the  inscription.  All  the 
time  she  was  thinking  that  this  sum  of  money  would  furnish 
a  house  in  a  style  vastly  superior  to  that  of  Mrs.  Nibby's.  Mrs. 
Nibby  would  go  black  in  the  face  with  envy,  hatred  and  malice. 
As  she  reflected  Christopher  talked,  drawing  her  to  the  least- 


TO  THE  TOWER  123 

frequented  part  of  the  huge  roaring  railway  station.  '  Will 
you,  Polly  ?     Why  don't  you  speak  ?     Do,  Polly,  do  ! ' 

"  She  all  but  spoke,  would  have  done  but  for  an  ear-rending 
whistle  from  an  engine. 

"  '  I  shall  have  a  rise,  too,  Polly.  I'm  feeling  my  feet  at 
Swettenham's.  Who  knows  what  I  may  get  to  ?  Polly, 
I  might — I  might  some  day  have  a  big  business  of  my  own, 
and  build  a  house  at  Eastbourne.  It's  all  on  the  cards,  Polly. 
Others  have  done  it  before  me.  Swettenham  began  as  a  clerk — 
he  did.     Think,  Polly,  five  hundred  and  fifty  pounds — Hyjene ! ' 

"  She  met  his  eye  ;  she  nodded. 

"  '  You  ivill  ?  ' 

"  '  Don't  mind  if  I  do.' 

"  '  Hooray  !    Hyjene  for  ever  !    Hooray — ay — ay  ! 


>  >> 


Or  at  Liverpool  Street  Station  we  may  meet  three 
of  Gissing's  people  whom  we  have  seen  before  in  these 
pages.  Jane  Snowdon,  her  grandfather,  and  Sidney 
Kirkwood,  out  of  The  Nether  World,  had  arranged 
to  go  on  a  holiday  together  to  Chelmsford — a  holi- 
day fraught  with  brief  happiness  and  long  tragedy 
for  two  of  them  ;  for  it  was  whilst  they  were  away 
there  that  Sidney  and  Jane  realised  that  they  loved 
each  other.  Jane  had  never  been  into  the  country 
before,  and  was  in  a  fever  of  apprehensions  till  they 
had  started  : 

"  The  last  week  was  a  time  of  impatience,  resolutely  sup- 
pressed. On  the  Saturday  afternoon  Sidney  was  to  meet  them 
at  Liverpool  Street.  Would  anything  happen  these  last  few 
days — this  last  day — this  last  hour  ?  No  ;  all  three  stood 
together  on  the  platform,  and  their  holiday  had  already  begun. 

"  Over  the  pest-stricken  regions  of  East  London,  sweltering 
in  sunshine  which  served  only  to  reveal  the  intimacies  of 
abomination  ;  across  miles  of  a  city  of  the  damned,  such  as 
thought  never  conceived  before  this  age  of  ours  ;  above  streets 
swarming  with  a  nameless  populace,  cruelly  exposed  by  the 


124  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

unwonted  light  of  heaven ;  stopping  at  stations  which  it 
crushes  the  heart  to  think  should  be  the  destination  of  any 
mortal ;  the  train  made  its  way  at  length  beyond  the  outmost 
limits  of  dread^  and  entered  upon  a  land  of  level  meadows,  of 
hedges  and  trees,  of  crops  and  cattle." 

With  its  great  gateways,  its  long,  always  busy 
approaches,  its  staircases  and  bridges,  its  high  sweep 
of  glass  roof  and  many  platforms,  Liverpool  Street 
is  too  like  any  other  London  terminus  to  need  de- 
scribing in  detail ;  but  I  think  of  that  last  passage 
we  have  quoted,  and  a  score  of  others  from  Gissing's 
works,  when  his  critics  tell  us  that  he  loathed  and 
despised  the  poor  he  had  been  forced  to  live  among 
and  was  never  in  sympathy  with  them. 

Houndsditch  was  originally  a  wide  ditch  just 
outside  the  City  wall.  When  it  was  filled  in  and  the 
street  built,  it  seems  to  have  fallen  into  the  hands 
of  the  Jews,  who  are  its  chief  inhabitants  to  this 
day.  Second-hand  clothes  dealers  are  plentiful  in 
the  lanes  and  furtive  alleys  to  the  left  which  taper 
away  towards  Petticoat  Lane ;  and  most  of  the 
names  over  the  very  miscellaneous  shops  of  Hounds- 
ditch  are  the  names  of  English  or  foreign  Jews.  One 
thing  that  warms  me  towards  the  street  is  a  worn 
old  tavern  in  it  that  is  called  the  Ben  Jonson.  Now- 
adays the  reputation  of  "  Rare  Ben  "  has  contracted, 
and  he  is  no  god  any  longer  except  in  literary 
circles  ;  but  in  his  own  age,  and  for  years  after,  his 
name  was  familiar  to  the  multitude ;  he  was  a 
glorious  magnetic  personality  in  the  social  as  well 
as  in  the  theatrical  life  of  his  time,  and  it  is  signifi- 
cant of  his  popularity  as  a  true  Londoner  that  inns 
crowned  with  his  name  were  dotted  all  about  the 


TO  THE  TO^VER  125 

town  whose  streets  and  byways  are  inseparably 
associated  with  him  and  his  work,  I  have  known 
several,  and  five  of  them  still  flourish,  four  in  central 
London,  and  one  as  far  afield  as  Harrow  Road. 

We  turn  up  St.  Mary  Axe,  which  we  have  already 
glanced  at  from  the  other  end  ;  and  I  wish  again 
there  were  more  of  the  old  houses  left  in  it,  and  one 
that  we  might  recognise  as  the  house  of  Pubsey 
and  Co.  to  the  roof  of  which  Riah,  Jenny  Wren  and 
Lizzie  Hexam  would  climb,  to  "  come  and  be  dead," 
to  rest  and  chat  and  forget  the  worries  of  the  world 
below  under  the  wide  sky,  among  the  chimney- 
stacks.  This  being  past  praying  for,  however,  we 
take  the  first  turning  to  the  left  out  of  St.  Mary  Axe, 
and  are  in  Bevis  Marks,  and  here  we  are  a  little  more 
fortunate.  There  is  only  one  tavern  in  Bevis  Marks  ; 
it  is  on  the  eastern  side,  at  an  odd  corner  where  the 
street  falls  away  slightly  before  it  merges  into  Duke 
Street ;  and  this  is  the  public-house  that  enjoyed 
the  patronage  of  no  less  a  person  than  Dick  Swiveller. 
The  offices  of  Mr.  Sampson  Brass  used  to  be  here- 
abouts, and  this  was  "  Mr.  Swiveller's  usual  house 
of  entertainment  in  Bevis  Marks."  Quilp  dropped 
in  to  see  him  in  it  one  day  just  as  he  "  sat  down 
alone  to  dinner  in  its  dusky  parlour."  From 
Sampson  Brass's  office  Dick  was  in  the  habit  of 
"  darting  across  the  street  for  a  glass  of  mild  porter," 
so  you  may  make  up  your  mind  that  the  office  was 
over  the  way,  and  over  the  way,  until  lately,  sur- 
vived an  old  house  that  may  well  have  been  that 
which  Sampson  and  his  sister  occupied.  A  mean, 
wizened,  ghostly  looking  house,  discoloured  with  age, 
that  with  its  step  or  two  up  to  the  fiont  door,  its  dull. 


126  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

low  window,  its  grated  basement,  and  the  curious 
air  of  slyness  and  secrecy  that  brooded  over  it, 
seemed  far  more  in  harmony  with  all  we  know  of  the 
Brasses  than  does  the  larger  house  next  but  one  to 
the  tavern  which  has  also  strong  points  of  resem- 
blance to  the  house  as  Dickens  sketched  it.  He 
says  it  was  "  a  small  dark  house,"  and 

"  In  the  parlour  window  of  this  little  habitation,  which  is  so 
close  upon  the  footway  that  the  passenger  who  takes  the  wall 
brushes  the  dim  glass  with  his  coat-sleeve — much  to  its  im- 
provement, for  it  is  very  dirty — in  this  parlour  window,  in  the 
days  of  its  occupation  by  Sampson  Brass,  there  hung,  all  awry 
and  slack  and  discoloured  by  the  sun,  a  curtain  of  faded  green, 
so  threadbare  from  long  service  as  by  no  means  to  intercept 
the  view  of  the  little  dark  room,  but  rather  to  afford  a  favour- 
able medium  through  which  to  observe  it  accurately.  There 
was  not  much  to  look  at.  A  rickety  table,  with  spare  bundles 
of  papers,  yellow  and  ragged  from  long  carriage  in  the  pocket, 
ostentatiously  displayed  upon  its  top  ;  a  couple  of  stools,  set 
face  to  face  on  opposite  sides  of  this  crazy  piece  of  furniture ; 
a  treacherous  old  chair  by  the  fireplace,  whose  withered  arms 
had  hugged  full  many  a  client  and  helped  to  squeeze  him  dry  ; 
a  second-hand  wig-box,  used  as  a  depository  for  blank  writs 
and  declarations  and  other  small  forms  of  law,  once  the  sole 
contents  of  the  head  which  belonged  to  the  wig  which  belonged 
to  the  box,  as  they  were  now  of  the  box  itself ;  two  or  three 
common  books  of  practice  ;  a  jar  of  ink,  a  pounce  box,  a 
stunted  hearth-broom,  a  carpet  trodden  to  shreds  but  still 
clinging  with  the  tightness  of  desperation  to  its  tacks — these, 
with  the  yellow  wainscot  of  the  walls,  the  smoke-discoloured 
ceiling,  the  dust  and  cobwebs,  were  among  the  most  prominent 
decorations  of  the  office  of  Mr  Sampson  Brass.  But  this 
was  mere  still-life,  of  no  greater  importance  than  the  plate, 
'  Brass,  Solicitor,'  upon  the  door,  and  the  bill,  '  First  floor 
to  let  to  a  single  gentleman,'  which  was  tied  to  the  knocker. 
The  office  commonly  held  two  examples  of  animated  nature. 


TO  THE  TOWER  127 

...  Of  these,  one  was  Mr  Brass  himself.  .  .  .  The  other  was 
his  clerk,  assistant,  housekeeper,  secretary,  confidential  plotter, 
adviser,  intriguer,  and  bill  of  cost  increaser,  Miss  Brass— a 
kind  of  amazon  at  common  law  ...  a  lady  of  thirty-five  or 
thereabouts,  of  a  gaunt  and  bony  figure,  and  a  resolute  bearing 
which,  if  it  repressed  the  softer  emotions  of  love  and  kept 
admirers  at  a  distance,  certainly  inspired  a  feeling  akin  to  awe 
in  the  breasts  of  those  male  strangers  who  had  the  happiness 
to  approach  her." 

Not  only  the  house  of  Sampson  Brass  in  Bevis 
Marks  and  the  tavern  nearly  opposite,  but  the  whole 
of  the  street  itself  belong  to  The  Old  Curiosity  Shop. 
The  parlour  of  that  small  dark  house  was  the  clerks' 
office  of  the  Brass  establishment,  and  for  a  time 
Dick  Swiveller  and  SaUy  sat  in  it  daily,  facing 
each  other  at  the  tall  desk,  and  despite  the  lady's 
stern,  forbidding  aspect,  the  blandishments  of  Dick 
Swiveller  were  so  potent  with  her  that  after  a  while 
he  could  with  impunity  snatch  off  her  fluttering 
head-dress  to  rub  the  window  clean  when  he  wanted 
to  look  out.  In  the  basement  under  the  office  toiled 
that  pitiable  little  drudge,  the  Marchionesss,  whom 
Dick  secretly  befriended.  Didn't  he  go  down,  when 
Sampson  and  Sally  were  out,  and  produce  a  pack 
of  cards  and  initiate  her  into  the  mysteries  of  a 
game  ?  Didn't  he,  on  at  least  one  occasion,  slip 
across  the  road  to  his  favourite  tavern  and  return 
followed  by  the  potboy  carrying  a  sumptuous  meal 
on  a  tray  for  that  same  Marchioness  ?  To  the  office 
Kit  came  again  and  again,  and  in  the  office,  having 
sent  Dick  out,  Sampson  from  time  to  time  inter- 
viewed the  boy  and  matured  his  plan  for  having  a 
certain  bank-note  found  upon  Kit's  person  in  order 


128  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

that  he  might  have  him  arrested  on  a  charge  of 
stealing  it.  And  to  the  office  one  morning  came 
that  gay  spirit,  Mr.  Chuckster,  one  of  Mr.  Swiveller's 
boon  companions  and  a  brother-member  of  the 
Glorious  Apollos.  He  rang  the  bell,  Dick  opened, 
and  Mr.  Chuckster  greeted  him  with  characteristic 
facetiousness  : 

"  '  You're  devilish  early  at  this  pestiferous  old  slaughter- 
house/ said  that  gentleman,  poising  himself  on  one  leg  and 
shaking  the  other  in  an  easy  manner. 

'  Rather/  returned  Dick. 

'  Rather  ! '  returned  Mr.  Chuckster,  with  that  air  of  graceful 
trifling  which  so  well  became  him.  '  /  should  think  so.  Why, 
my  good  feller,  do  you  know  what  o'clock  it  is — half  past 
nine  a.m.  in  the  morning  ?  ' 

'  Won't  you  come  in  ?  '  said  Dick.  '  All  alone.  Swiveller 
solus.     "  'Tis  now  the  witching —  " 

'  "  Hour  of  night  !  " 

'  "  When  churchyards  yawn," 

'  "  And  graves  give  up  their  dead." 

'  At  the  end  of  this  quotation  in  dialogue,  each  gentleman 
struck  an  attitude,  and  immediately  subsiding  into  prose 
walked  into  the  office.  Such  morsels  of  enthusiasm  are  common 
among  the  Glorious  Apollos,  and  were  indeed  the  links  that 
bound  them  together  and  raised  them  above  the  cold  dull  earth. 

'  Well,  and  how  are  you,  my  buck  ?  '  said  Mr.  Chuckster, 
taking  a  stool.  '  I  was  forced  to  come  into  the  City  upon 
some  Httle  private  matters  of  my  own,  and  couldn't  pass  the 
corner  of  the  street  without  looking  in,  but  upon  my  soul 
I  didn't  expect  to  find  you.     It  is  so  everlastingly  early.'  " 

Their  conversation  is  presently  interrupted  by 
the  arrival  of  Kit,  and  just  after  Kit  has  been  called 
away  upstairs  by  the  single  gentleman  who  is  lodging 
there  and  who  has  heard  his  voice,  Sampson  and 
Sally   Brass   come  in  from   breakfast ;    at   sight   of 


fredyidcock 


"Quite  the  cUancst  ntut  most  resficela/Ue  house  on  the  Hank  Sitie,"  ivherein 
Lawrence  Waller  had  taken  lodgings.     Besaut.  "  ///,■  Hell  of  St.  I'aul's." 

Chapter  S 


TO  THE  TOWER  129 

them  Mr.  Chuckster  retires ;  Sampson  despatches 
Mr.  Swiveller  with  a  letter  to  Peckham  Rye,  then 
taps  his  nose  to  his  sister,  who  leaves  him  alone, 
and  he  waits  thus  till  Kit  comes  down  from  the 
lodger,  when  he  beckons  him  into  the  office  with 
his  pen,  chats  with  him  of  Quilp,  and  tips  him 
generously,  in  pursuance  of  that  scheme  for  his 
downfall.  Quilp  was  in  and  out  of  the  office  fre- 
quently. The  single  gentleman,  lodging  upstairs, 
was,  you  know,  little  Nell's  uncle,  the  younger  son 
of  that  old  grandfather  with  whom  she  went  on  her 
eventful  wanderings.  He  was  drawn  to  the  lodg- 
ings partly  by  that  bill  tied  to  the  knocker,  and 
partly  no  doubt  by  a  knowledge  of  Sampson  Brass's 
connection  with  the  two  wanderers  whom  he  was 
anxious  to  find.  He  had  learned  that  they  were 
last  seen  in  the  company  of  those  strolling  Punch 
and  Judy  proprietors,  Messrs  Codlin  and  Short, 
and  his  efforts  to  meet  or  hear  news  of  them  accounted 
for  some  of  those  eccentricities  of  his  that  annoyed 
and  puzzled  Sampson  and  his  sister  : 

"  The  single  gentleman  among  his  other  peculiarities — 
and  he  had  a  very  plentiful  stock,  of  which  he  every  day 
furnished  some  new  specimen — took  a  most  extraordinary  and 
remarkable  interest  in  the  exhibition  of  Punch.  If  the  sound 
of  a  Punch's  voice,  at  ever  so  remote  a  distance,  reached 
Bevis  Marks,  the  single  gentleman,  though  in  bed  and  asleep, 
would  start  up  and  hurrying  on  his  clothes,  make  for  the  spot 
with  all  speed,  and  presently  returned  at  the  end  of  a  long 
procession  of  idlers,  having  in  the  midst  the  theatre  and  its 
proprietors.  vStraightway,  the  stage  would  be  set  up  in  front 
of  Mr.  Brass's  house ;  the  single  gentleman  would  establish 
himself  at  the  first  floor  window  ;  and  the  entertainment 
would  proceed,  with  all  its  exciting  accompaniments  of  fife 


130  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  drum  and  shout,  to  the  excessive  consternation  of  sober 
votaries  of  business  in  that  silent  thoroughfare.  It  might 
have  been  expected  that  when  the  play  was  done  both  players 
and  audience  would  have  dispersed  ;  but  the  epilogue  was  as 
bad  as  the  play,  for  no  sooner  was  the  Devil  dead,  than  the 
manager  of  the  puppets  and  his  partner  were  summoned  by  the 
single  gentleman  to  his  chamber,  where  they  were  regaled 
with  strong  waters  from  his  private  store,  and  where  they  held 
long  conversations,  the  purport  of  which  no  human  being 
could  fathom.  But  the  secret  of  these  discussions  was  of  little 
importance.  It  was  sufficient  to  know  that  while  they  were 
proceeding,  the  concourse  without  still  lingered  round  the 
house  ;  that  boys  beat  upon  the  drum  with  their  fists,  and 
imitated  Punch  with  their  tender  voices ;  that  the  office 
window  was  rendered  opaque  by  flattened  noses  and  the  key- 
hole of  the  street  door  luminous  with  eyes  ;  that  every  time 
the  single  gentleman  or  either  of  his  guests  were  seen  at  the 
upper  window,  or  so  much  as  the  end  of  one  of  their  noses  was 
visible,  there  was  a  great  shout  of  execration  from  the  excluded 
mob,  who  remained  howling  and  yelling  and  refusing  consolation, 
until  the  exhibitors  were  delivered  up  to  them  to  be  attended 
elsewhere.  It  was  sufficient,  in  short,  to  know  that  Bevis 
Marks  was  revolutionised  by  these  popular  movements,  and 
that  peace  and  quietness  fled  from  its  precincts." 

Sampson  Brass  was  particularly  exasperated  by 
this  state  of  things,  but  he  could  not  afford  to  put 
his  foot  down  and  lose  an  uncommonly  profitable 
lodger  ;  Mr.  Swiveller,  however,  enjoyed  it,  and  he 
and  Sally  generally  watched  the  performances  from 
their  window  ;  until  a  day  came  when  the  men  with 
Punch  turned  out  to  be  Codlin  and  Short  themselves, 
and  the  single  gentleman  had  no  interest  in  such 
shows  thereafter.  It  is  glory  enough  for  Bevis 
Marks  that  Codlin  and  Short  once  performed  in  it 
before  Mr.  Brass's  door ;    and  if  you  say  that  none 


TO  THE  TOWER  131 

of  these  things  ever  really  happened,  I  would  like 
you  to  tell  me  of  anything  in  Bevis  Marks's  history 
that  seems  more  real.  There  is  a  synagogue  close  by 
in  Bury  Street  that  was  attended  by  Isaac  D' Israeli ; 
Lord  Beaconsfield,  in  his  boyhood,  went  there 
with  his  father,  till  they  seceded  from  the  Jewish 
faith  ;  but  for  every  one  who  associates  Bevis  Marks 
with  them  now  there  are  at  least  a  thousand  who 
associate  it  with  the  Brasses  and  Quilp,  with  Dick 
Swiveller  and  the  Marchioness,  with  Codlin  and 
Short  and  the  tale  of  Little  Nell. 

Wherever  you  go  about  central  London  you  pass 
by  places  that  Defoe  has  made  memorable  in  his 
Journal  of  the  Plague.  He  tells  you  of  the  dis- 
tracted preachers  who  haunted  the  streets  :  of  one 
in  particular  who  went  hither  and  thither  by  day 
and  night  crying  out  dreadfully,  "  Yet  forty  days, 
and  London  shall  be  destroyed."  He  teUs  you 
how  in  those  days  of  desolation  he  (or  the  imaginary 
writer  of  the  Journal)  saw  the  grass  growing  along 
Bishopsgate,  and  the  dead  being  buried  in  great 
pits  in  Hand  Alley,  Bishopsgate,  and  in  Petticoat 
Lane  ;  but  some  of  the  most  terribly  vivid  incidents 
he  describes  have  Houndsditch  for  their  scene ; 
as  thus  : 

"  As  I  went  along  Houndsditch  one  morning  about  eight 
o'clock,  there  was  a  great  noise  .  .  .  the  outcry  was  loud 
enough  to  prompt  my  curiosity,  and  I  called  to  one,  who  looked 
out  of  a  window,  and  asked  what  was  the  matter.  A  watch- 
man, it  seems,  had  been  employed  to  keep  his  post  at  the  door 
of  a  house  which  was  infected,  or  said  to  be  infected,  and 
was  shut  up.  He  had  been  there  all  night,  for  two  nights 
together,  as  he  told  his  story,  and  the  day  watchman  had 


132  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

been  there  one  day,  and  was  now  come  to  relieve  him.  All 
this  while  no  noise  had  been  heard  in  the  house,  no  light  had 
been  seen,  they  called  for  nothing,  had  sent  him  no  errands, 
which  used  to  be  the  chief  business  of  the  watchmen,  neither 
had  they  given  him  any  disturbance,  as  he  said,  from  Monday 
afternoon,  when  he  heard  a  great  crying  and  screaming  in  the 
house,  which,  as  he  supposed,  was  occasioned  by  some  of  the 
family  dying  just  at  that  time.  It  seems  the  night  before, 
the  dead-cart,  as  it  was  called,  had  been  stopped  there,  and  a 
servant  maid  had  been  brought  down  to  the  door  dead,  and 
the  buriers  or  bearers,  as  they  were  called,  put  her  into  the 
cart,  wrapped  only  in  a  green  rug,  and  carried  her  away.  The 
watchman  had  knocked  at  the  door,  it  seems,  when  he  heard 
that  noise  and  crying,  as  above,  and  nobody  answered  a  great 
while  ;  but  at  last  one  looked  out  and  said,  with  an  angry 
quick  tone,  and  yet  in  a  kind  of  crying  voice,  or  a  voice  of  one 
that  was  crying,  '  What  d'ye  want,  that  you  make  such  a 
knocking  ?  '  He  answered,  '  I  am  the  watchman  ;  how  do 
you  do  ?  What  is  the  matter  ? '  The  person  answered, 
'  What  is  that  to  you  ?  Stop  the  dead-cart.'  This  it  seems 
was  about  one  o'clock  ;  soon  after,  as  the  fellow  said,  he  stopped 
the  dead-cart,  and  then  knocked  again,  but  nobody  answered. 
He  continued  knocking,  and  the  bellman  called  out  several 
times,  '  Bring  out  your  dead  ; '  but  nobody  answered,  till  the 
man  that  drove  the  cart  being  called  to  other  houses,  would 
stay  no  longer,  and  drove  away. 

"  The  watchman  knew  not  what  to  make  of  all  this,  so  he  let 
them  alone  till  the  morning-man,  or  day-watchman  as  they 
called  him,  came  to  relieve  him  ;  giving  him  an  account  of  the 
particulars,  they  knocked  at  the  door  a  great  while,  but  nobody 
answered,  and  they  observed  that  the  window  or  casement  at 
which  the  person  looked  out  who  had  answered  before,  con- 
tinued open,  being  up  two  pair  of  stairs.  Upon  this  the  two 
men,  to  satisfy  their  curiosity,  got  a  long  ladder,  and  one  of 
them  went  up  to  the  window  and  looked  into  the  room,  where 
he  saw  a  woman  lying  dead  upon  the  floor,  in  a  dismal  manner, 
having  no  clothes  on  her  but  her  shift ;  but  though  he  called 
aloud,  and  putting  in  his  long  staff  knocked  hard  on  the  floor, 


TO  THE  TOWER  138 

yet  nobody  stirred  or  answered,  neither  could  he  hear  any 
noise  in  the  house.  He  came  down  again  upon  this,  and 
acquainted  his  fellow,  who  went  up  also,  and  finding  it  just  so, 
they  resolved  to  acquaint  either  the  Lord  Mayor  or  some  other 
magistrate  of  it,  but  did  not  offer  to  go  in  at  the  window. 
The  magistrate,  it  seems,  upon  the  information  of  the  two  men, 
ordered  the  house  to  be  broke  open,  a  constable  and  other 
persons  being  appointed  to  be  present  that  nothing  might  be 
plundered  ;  and  accordingly  it  was  so  done,  when  nobody  was 
found  in  the  house  but  that  young  woman  who,  having  been 
infected  and  past  recovery,  the  rest  had  left  her  to  die  by 
herself,  and  every  one  gone,  having  found  some  way  to  delude 
the  watchman  and  to  get  open  the  door,  or  get  out  at  some 
back-door,  or  over  the  tops  of  the  houses,  so  that  he  knew 
nothing  of  it ;  and  as  to  those  cries  and  shrieks  which  he  heard, 
it  was  supposed  they  were  the  passionate  cries  of  the  family 
at  this  bitter  parting,  which  to  be  sure  it  was  to  them  all,  this 
being  the  sister  to  the  mistress  of  the  family.  The  man  of 
the  house,  his  wife,  several  children  and  servants,  being  all 
gone  and  fled,  whether  sick  or  sound,  that  I  could  never  learn, 
nor,  indeed,  did  I  make  much  enquiry  after  it," 

But  of  Defoe's  Houndsditch  pictures  none  takes 
such  a  strong  hold  on  the  imagination  and  the  memory 
as  his  lurid,  unforgettable  description  of  the  plague 
pit  that  was  dug  in  the  churchyard  there,  and  of 
some  of  the  bizarre  incidents  that  happened  around 
it.  The  church  of  St.  Botolph,  Aldgate,  stands  at 
the  eastern  corner  of  Houndsditch,  and  at  the  back 
of  the  churchyard  still  runs  the  Alley  that  Defoe 
mentions  ;  it  opens  out  of  Houndsditch,  and  beyond 
the  wall  of  the  churchyard  turns  to  the  right  and 
brings  you  into  Aldgate,  by  the  Three  Nuns  Tavern, 
a  successor  to  the  inn  of  the  same  name  that  figures 
in  the  Journal  of  the  Plague.  The  imaginary  citizen 
who  kept   the   Journal  lived  in   Aldgate,   and  says 


134  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

he  never  had  any  fears  for  his  own  safety  until  "  they 
dug  the  great  pit  in  the  churchyard  of  our  parish 
of  Aldgate."  He  describes  it  as  a  "  dreadful  gulf," 
and  says  that  people  of  the  parish  protested  against 
the  unnecessary  size  of  it,  but  the  churchwardens 
knew  what  they  were  about,  many  other  pits  had 
already  been  filled,  and  this  too  was  full  before  the 
plague  ended  : 

"  A  terrible  pit  it  was,  and  I  could  not  resist  my  curiosity 
to  go  and  see  it ;  as  near  as  I  may  judge,  it  was  about  forty 
feet  in  length,  and  about  fifteen  or  sixteen  feet  broad ;  and, 
at  the  time  I  first  looked  at  it,  about  nine  feet  deep  ;  but  it 
was  said  they  dug  it  near  twenty  feet  deep  afterwards,  in  one 
part  of  it,  till  they  could  go  no  deeper  for  the  water.  .  .  . 
I  doubt  not  but  that  there  may  be  some  ancient  persons  alive 
in  the  parish  who  can  justify  the  fact  of  this,  and  are  able  to 
show  even  in  what  place  of  the  churchyard  the  pit  lay  better 
than  I  can ;  the  mark  of  it  also  was  many  years  to  be  seen  in 
the  churchyard  on  the  surface,  lying  in  length  parallel  with 
the  passage  which  goes  by  the  west  wall  of  the  churchyard, 
out  of  Houndsditch,  and  turns  east  again  into  Whitechapel, 
coming  out  near  the  Three  Nuns  Inn." 

The  entry  relating  to  this  dreadful  pit  is  too  long 
for  quotation  in  full.  The  writer  tells,  in  Defoe's 
minutely  realistic  fashion,  of  the  horrors  and  tragic 
misery  that  happened  about  its  black  depth  ;  how 
the  carts  came  up  by  night  loaded  with  the  dead 
who  were  flung  into  it  ;  how  in  the  light  of  fires  and 
torches  that  flared  beside  it,  men  grief -stricken  by 
the  loss  of  all  they  loved  would  come  crying  and 
raging  desperately  to  the  pit's  edge ;  how  poor 
wretches,  mad  with  knowing  that  the  plague  was 
upon  them,  would  rush  across  the  churchyard  and 
hurl  themselves  down  upon  the  massed  bodies  heaped 


TO  THE  TOWER  135 

in  that  appalling  hole.  On  the  loth  September 
1665,  says  the  writer  of  the  Journal,  "  my  curiosity 
led,  or  rather  drove  me  to  go  and  see  this  pit  again." 
By  day,  loose  earth  was  strewn  over  those  who  lay 
in  it  ;  so  he  "  resolved  to  go  in  the  night,  and  see 
some  of  them  thrown  in."  He  knew  the  sexton, 
who  was  willing  to  admit  him  into  the  churchyard 
but  was  trying  to  dissuade  him  from  the  risk  of 
going,  when  "  I  saw  two  links  come  over  from  the 
end  of  the  Minories  "  (which  is  almost  opposite  the 
church),  "  and  heard  the  bellman,  and  then  appeared  a 
dead-cart,  as  they  called  it,  coming  over  the  streets  ; 
so  I  could  no  longer  resist  my  desire  of  seeing, 
and  went  in."  He  found  lingering  by  the  pit,  a 
weeping  wretch  wrapped  in  a  brown  cloak  ;  his  wife 
and  several  of  his  children  were  in  this  cart  that  was 
just  arriving,  and  when  he  saw  "  the  cart  turned 
round  and  the  bodies  shot  into  the  pit  promiscuously," 
he  was  so  overcome  that  he  fell  in  a  swoon.  When 
he  recovered,  the  bearers  "  led  him  away  to  the 
Pye  Tavern,  over  against  the  end  of  Houndsditch, 
where,  it  seems,  the  man  was  known,  and  where 
they  took  care  of  him."  As  the  author  of  the  Journal 
was  leaving  the  churchyard,  "  and  turning  up  the 
street  towards  my  own  house,  I  saw  another  cart, 
with  links,  and  a  bellman  going  before,  coming  out 
of  Harrow  Alley,  in  the  Butcher-row,  on  the  other 
side  of  the  way  ;  "  it  was  full  of  bodies  and  came 
directly  to  the  church.  He  goes  on  to  tell  you  of 
that  Pye  Tavern.  It  had  become  the  haunt  of  "  a 
dreadful  set  of  fellows  "  in  whom  the  plague  had 
produced  a  spirit  of  godless  and  reckless  defiance  ; 
they  drank    and    revelled    there    roaringly.     "  They 


136  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

sat  generally  in  a  room  next  the  street ;  and  as  they 
always  kept  late  hours,  so  when  the  dead-cart  came 
across  the  street  end  to  go  into  Houndsditch,  which 
was  in  view  of  the  tavern  windows,  they  would 
frequently  open  the  windows  as  soon  as  they  heard 
the  bell,  and  look  out  at  them  ;  and  as  they  might 
often  hear  sad  lamentations  of  the  people  in  the 
streets,  or  at  their  windows,  as  the  carts  went  along, 
they  would  make  their  impudent  mocks  and  jeers 
at  them,  especially  if  they  heard  the  poor  people 
call  upon  God  to  have  mercy  upon  them,  as  many 
would  do  at  those  times,  in  their  ordinary  passing 
along  the  streets." 

Is  it  possible  to  imagine  that  such  a  Walpurgis- 
night  tavern  ever  stood  among  the  dingy,  decorous 
shops  at  this  end  of  Houndsditch,  with  those  devil- 
may-care  drunkards  lolling  from  its  windows  making 
the  ghastly  nights  more  hideous  ?  It  has  vanished 
like  a  nightmare  ;  yet  I  cannot  tread  that  end  of 
Houndsditch  without  having  the  light  of  those  links 
flickering  in  my  eyes,  the  rumble  of  the  dead-cart, 
the  clang  of  the  bell  and  those  raucous  voices  in  my 
ears.  Here  still  is  the  churchyard,  once  a  place  of 
wildest,  darkest  horror,  looking  peaceful  enough 
now  in  the  afternoon  sunlight,  with  its  worn,  old 
tombstones  brooding  amid  the  long  grass,  the  scar 
of  that  grisly  pit  so  completely  healed  that  you  can 
see  no  trace  of  it. 

If  we  take  the  ancient  passage  out  of  Hounds- 
ditch, by  the  wall  at  the  back  of  the  churchyard, 
we  walk  near  the  edge  of  the  fearsome,  invisible 
pit  ;  and  following  the  turn  of  the  passage,  to  the 
right,  we  emerge  upon  Aldgate,   against  the  Three 


TO  THE  TOWER  137 

Nuns  Tavern.  Aldgate — the  gate  itself — used  to 
stand  to  the  west  of  Houndsditch  (Chaucer  for  a 
time  lived  in  a  house  over  the  gateway)  ;  and  Defoe's 
imaginary  writer  of  the  Journal  says,  "  I  lived  with- 
out Aldgate,  about  midway  between  Aldgate  Church 
and  WTiitechapel  Bars,  on  the  left  hand,  or  north 
side  of  the  street."  So  he  must  have  lived  facing 
the  Butcher  Row  that  he  talks  of,  and  that  still 
stands,  retaining  its  ancient  character  and  much 
of  its  ancient  aspect.  If  you  have  read  the  Journal 
of  the  Plague  and  Harrison  Ainsworth's  best  novel, 
Old  St.  Paul's  (which  draws  freely  on  Defoe  for  its 
scenes  and  incidents),  all  London,  from  Holbom  and 
the  Strand  to  Aldgate,  is  curiously,  eerily  alive  for 
you  with  memories  of  that  blackest  year  in  the 
city's  history  ;  certain  streets  and  corners  are  for 
ever  inseparable  from  some  sharply  definite  develop- 
ment of  the  plague,  and  nearly  all  these  remem- 
brances are  charged  with  pain  and  terror,  but  at 
the  comer  of  the  Minories,  whence  Defoe's  Journalist 
saw  the  links  coming  with  the  dead-cart,  there  is 
a  quaver  of  lighter  voices  in  the  air — of  voices  full 
of  a  relief  and  thankfulness  that  strangely  touches 
your  emotions  ;  for  Defoe  (or  his  Journalist)  records 
how,  when  the  worst  of  the  plague  was  over,  and 
the  citizens  moving  abroad  more  freely  again, 

"  It  was  a  common  thing  to  meet  people  in  the  street  that 
were  strangers,  anri  that  we  knew  nothing  at  all  of,  expressing 
their  surprise.  Going  one  day  through  Aldgate,  and  a  pretty 
many  people  being  passing  and  repassing,  there  comes  a  man 
out  of  the  end  of  the  Minories,  and  looking  a  little  up  the 
street  and  down,  he  throws  his  hands  abroad  :  Lord,  what 
an  alteration  is  here  !    Why,  last  week  I  came  along  here  and 


138  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

hardly  any  body  was  to  be  seen.  Another  man,  I  heard  him, 
adds  to  his  words  :  'Tis  all  wonderful,  'tis  all  a  dream.  Blessed 
be  God,  says  a  third  man,  and  let  us  give  thanks  to  Him,  for 
'tis  all  His  own  doing.  Human  help  and  human  skill  was  at 
an  end.  These  were  all  strangers  to  one  another  ;  but  such 
salutations  as  these  were  frequent  in  the  street  every  day  ; 
and  in  spite  of  a  loose  behaviour,  the  very  common  people 
went  along  the  streets  giving  thanks  to  God  for  their 
deliverance." 

Our  way  lies  through  the  Minories,  but  before  we 
go  on  I  want  to  make  a  flying  visit  to  one  or  two 
places  farther  eastwards.  The  literary  associations 
of  the  East  End  need  a  book  to  themselves  ;  it  is 
impossible  to  deal  adequately  with  them  here,  where 
considerations  of  space  keep  us  from  straying  much 
beyond  the  square  mile  of  the  actual  city  of  London. 
Aldgate,  Whitechapel,  Mile  End — they  were  all 
common  ground  for  the  Elizabethan  playwrights  ; 
the  train  bands  used  to  march  out  for  practice  at 
Mile  End,  and  I  have  an  odd  kindness  to  that  "  Ned 
of  Aldgate,"  the  drummer  of  whom  casual,  passing 
mention  is  made  in  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  Knight 
of  the  Burning  Pestle,  one  scene  of  which  is  laid  at 
Mile  End.  The  shadow  of  Defoe's  ubiquitous  Colonel 
Jack  roams  all  about  Whitechapel,  Bethnal  Green 
and  Mile  End  :  his  clothes  being  worn  to  rags,  the 
young  rapscallion  went  into  a  broker's  shop  near 
Whitechapel  church  and  laid  out  part  of  his  share 
of  a  recent  robbery  on  the  purchase  of  a  new  suit, 
and  afterwards  went  into  the  churchyard  to  put 
the  things  on.  The  Journal  of  the  Plague  tells  grisly 
tales  of  Whitechapel ;  the  Bull  Inn,  Whitechapel, 
was   a  stopping  place  of    the  coach  driven  by  Mr. 


TO  THE  TOWER  139 

Weller,  and  Mr.  Pickwick  set  out  thence  on  his  journey 
to  Ipswich,  and  discoursed  with  Mr.  Weller  on  the 
queemess  of  the  lives  lived  by  turnpike  keepers  as 
they  passed  the  Mile  End  turnpike  ;  and  when  the 
small  David  Copperfield  first  came  to  London,  from 
Blunderstone,  in  Suffolk,  he  was  set  down  at  an  inn 
"  in  the  Whitechapel  district.  ...  I  forget  whether 
it  was  the  Blue  Bull,  or  the  Blue  Boar ;  but  I  know 
it  was  the  Blue  Something,  and  that  its  likeness  was 
painted  on  the  back  of  the  coach  ;  "  and  here  Mr. 
Mell,  the  poor  usher  of  Mr.  Creakle's  school  met 
him  and  took  him  on  to  Blackheath.  But  Dickens 
is  all  about  the  East  End  ;  he  and  Sala  have  left 
sketches  of  its  highways  and  byways,  and  many 
scenes  of  Great  Expedatiotis  and  Our  Mutual  Friend 
take  place  in  its  most  squalid  quarters.  Rogue 
Riderhood  lived  at  Limehouse,  and  Miss  Abbey 
Potterson  kept  the  Six  Jolly  Fellowship  Porters 
there  by  the  waterside.  Gissing  went  little  into  the 
east  ;  he  found  squalor  and  drabness  enough  for 
his  purposes  among  the  lives  that  were  lived  in  the 
north  and  the  south  of  London.  No  novelist  of 
recent  years  was  more  closely  identified  with  the 
East  End  than  Sir  Walter  Besant  ;  he  knew  the 
east,  its  slums  and  its  grinding  poverty,  the  manners 
and  habits  of  its  people,  the  peculiar  characteristics 
of  every  part  of  it,  and  knew  them  intimately.  He 
was  a  born  teller  of  readable  tales,  but  he  lacked 
the  touch  of  genius  that  would  have  enabled  him 
to  make  his  characters  live  and  his  tales  immortal. 
Already  for  a  modern  reader,  they  arc  a  little  old- 
fashioned,  a  little  dull.  In  one  or  two  of  them  he 
is  so  bent  on  using  his  wide  knowledge  of  past  and 


140  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

present  London  that  they  are  less  novels  than  guide- 
books in  disguise  ;    in  all  of  them  he  writes  more 
as  a  romancist  than  a  realist,  and  in  some  of  them 
more  as  a  reformer  than  as  a  romancist.     His  favourite 
scheme  was  to  have  some  very  wealthy  man  or  girl 
and  to  send  him  or  her  to  work  in  the  East  End  for 
the  betterment  of  the  poor  ;   he  was  too  much  taken 
up  with  propaganda  ;    he  was  full  of  sympathy  for 
those  who  slaved  and  starved  and  lived  miserably 
in  London's  underworld,   but  he  went  among  them 
not  in  the  spirit  of  an  artist,  keen  to  study  char- 
acter and  realise  and  reveal  things  as  he  saw  them, 
but  in  the  spirit  of  the  University  Settlement  worker, 
the    kindly,    conscientious    philanthropist    who    was 
anxious    to   get   up    facts    and   expound   them    and 
lecture  about  them  and  show  how  the  worst  evils 
of  poverty  might   be   ameliorated.     Too  frequently, 
the  artist  is  altogether  lost  in  the  social  reformer  ; 
but  though  his  novels  are  dying  they  were  not  written 
in  vain.     They  were  written   with   a   purpose,   and 
something  of  their  purpose  has  been  achieved.     He 
will  be  remembered  at  the  end  of  the  day,  I  think, 
as    a    nineteenth-century    Stow    (his    topographical 
works  have  an  abiding  historical  value),  and  as  the 
author    of    All   Sorts    and    Conditions    of    Men — not 
because  that  is  the  most  interesting,  the  best  imagined 
or  the  ablest  of  his  many  novels,   but  because  its 
dream  of  the  wealthy  young  lady  who  went  to  dwell 
among  the  poor  of  Stepney,  set  up  in  business  and 
found  work  for  the  girls  of  the  neighbourhood,  estab- 
lished a  Club  for  them,  and  finally  reared  a  Palace 
of  Delight  which  should  serve  as  a  centre  of  mental 
and  physical  training  and  general  social  intercourse 


TO  THE  TOWER  141 

for  all  the  poverty-bitten  district,  resulted  in  the 
building  and  endowing  of  the  People's  Palace,  which 
stands  in  the  Mile  End  Road  and  is  Besant's  truest 
and  sufficient  monument.  Poets  and  novelists  have 
often  enough  dreamed  dreams  in  which  their  fellow  men 
have  been  uplifted  and  in  divers  ways  made  happier, 
but  when  before  did  any  poet  or  novelist  see  his 
thought  so  quickly  and  exactly  materialised  in  actual 
brick  and  stone  ?  If  you  have  been  to  some  of  the 
lectures,  concerts  and  meetings  there  you  will  know 
the  People's  Palace  is  an  oasis  of  light  and  refresh- 
ment in  a  dark  and  desert  place.  I  was  wandering 
along  Mile  End  Road  one  dismal  Sunday  evening, 
not  long  after  Besant  had  died,  and  noting  the 
announcement  of  an  organ  recital  posted  outside 
the  Palace  I  went  in  and  sat  in  the  great  hall  while 
it  filled.  Young  and  old,  well  dressed  and  shabby, 
happy  and  unhappy — they  filtered  quickly  in  and 
took  their  seats,  and  sat,  silent  or  chattering  softly, 
waiting  patiently  till  it  was  the  hour  for  beginning  ; 
and  it  was  touching  to  see  among  them  so  many 
pale  and  wistful  faces,  so  many  that  were  lined  with 
care  and  weariness,  so  many  who  were  obviously 
poor  and  heavy  laden.  And  when  the  first  low 
notes  began  to  breathe  from  the  organ-loft  a  deep 
silence  fell  upon  all  the  assembly,  and  looking  over 
its  sea  of  white,  intent  faces,  the  gauntest  of  them 
strangely  softened  already  as  under  some  magical 
dream-light,  I  could  not  help  thinking,  while  the 
music  gathered  in  fulness  and  majesty,  of  the  foul 
slums  and  mean  streets,  the  drab,  cramped  houses 
and  close  rooms,  the  broken  hearts  and  broken  lives 
that  lay  in  the  night  all  about  this  Palace — I  could 


142  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

not  help  thinking  of  these  things  until  the  music 
seemed  to  be  nothing  but  the  voice  of  them  all, 
weeping  quietly,  crying  out  in  impotent  grief  and 
anger,  throbbing  with  despair  and  regret,  mellowing 
to  a  restful  resignation,  yet  rising  out  of  that,  at 
last,  to  a  passionate  appeal  which  swelled  and  grew 
until  it  seemed  to  soar  like  a  very  fountain  of  prayer 
against  the  sin  of  this  rich,  Christian  city  in  which 
there  is  so  much  selfish  luxury  and  wrong,  so  much 
of  penury  and  suffering  and  such  foolish  waste  of 
life. 

Hearing  this,  and  seeing  that  crowd,  and  seeing 
the  work  of  the  place  on  week-days,  I  feel  that  per- 
haps it  was  a  finer  and  greater  thing  to  have  written 
All  Sorts  and  Conditions  of  Men  than  to  have  been 
a  rarer  artist  and  have  written  immortal  novels. 
To  have  created  the  People's  Palace,  to  have  lighted 
a  torch  in  the  darkness  of  the  East  End  that  shines 
like  a  morning  star  on  the  forehead  of  the  new  day, 
was  no  small  achievement.  The  book  will  soon  be 
old-fashioned  and  unreadable  and  so  die,  but  its 
influence  will  outlast  it,  and  will  be  stronger  and 
more  far-reaching  than  anyone  can  know.  Therefore 
Besant  becomes  more  than  respectable,  and  some  of 
the  scenes  that  his  fancy  played  with  are  shrines  for 
the  pilgrim. 

In  Mile  End  Road  are  the  Trinity  Almshouses, 
built  by  the  Corporation' of  Trinity  House  in  1695 
as  a  home  of  rest  for  master  mariners,  and  their 
wives  or  widows  ;  to  the  Almshouses  went  Angela, 
the  heroine  of  All  Sorts  and  Conditions  of  Men,  with 
Mr.  Bunker,  on  a  visit  to  old  Captain  Sorensen,  and 
they  remain  much  as  Angela  saw  them  : 


TO  THE  TOWER  143 

"  She  observed  that  she  was  standing  at  a  wicket  gate, 
and  that  over  the  gate  was  the  effigy  of  a  ship  in  full  sail  done 
in  stone.  Mr.  Bunker  opened  the  door,  and  led  the  way  to 
the  court  within.  Then  a  great  stillness  fell  upon  the  girl's 
spirit.  Outside  the  wagons,  carts  and  omnibuses  thundered 
and  rolled.  You  could  hear  them  plainly  enough  ;  you  could 
hear  the  tramp  of  a  thousand  feet.  But  the  noise  outside  was 
only  a  contrast  to  the  quiet  within.  A  wall  of  brick  with  iron 
railings  separated  the  tumult  from  the  calm.  It  seemed  as 
if,  within  that  court,  there  was  no  noise  at  all,  so  sharp  and 
sudden  was  the  contrast.  She  stood  in  an  oblong  court, 
separated  from  the  road  by  the  wall  above  named.  On  either 
hand  was  a  row  of  small  houses  containing,  apparently,  four 
rooms  each.  They  were  built  of  red  brick,  and  were  bright  and 
clean.  Every  house  had  an  iron  tank  in  front  for  water  ;  there 
was  a  pavement  of  flags  along  this  row,  and  a  grass  lawn 
occupied  the  middle  of  the  court.  Upon  the  grass  stood  the 
statue  of  a  benefactor,  and  at  the  end  of  the  court  was  a  chapel. 
It  was  a  very  little  chapel,  but  was  approached  by  a  most 
enormous  and  disproportionate  flight  of  stone  steps,  which 
might  have  been  originally  cut  for  the  portal  of  St.  Paul's 
Cathedral.  The  steps  were  surmounted  by  a  great  doorway, 
which  occupied  the  whole  west  front  of  the  chapel.  No  one 
was  moving  about  the  place  except  an  old  lady,  who  was 
drawing  water  from  her  tank. 

"  '  Pretty  place,  ain't  it  ?  '  asked  Mr.  Bunker. 

"  *  It  seems  peaceful  and  quiet,'  said  the  girl.   .  .  . 

"  He  led  the  way,  making  a  most  impertinent  echo  with  the 
heels  of  his  boots.  Angela  observed  immediately  that  there 
was  another  court  beyond  the  first.  In  fact  it  was  larger  ; 
the  houses  were  of  stone,  and  of  greater  size  ;  and  it  was  if 
anything  more  solemnly  quiet.  It  was  possessed  of  silence. 
Here  there  is  another  statue  erected  to  the  memory  of  the 
Founder,  who,  it  is  stated  on  the  pedestal,  died,  being  then 
'  Commander  of  a  Shipp  '  in  the  East  Indes,  in  the  year  1686. 
The  gallant  captain  is  represented  in  the  costume  of  the  period. 
He  wears  a  coat  with  many  buttons,  large  cuffs,  and  full  skirts  ; 
the  coat  is  buttoned  a  good  way  below  the  waist,  showing  the 


144  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

fair  doublet  within^  also  provided  with  many  buttons.  He 
wears  shoes  with  buckles^  has  a  soft  silk  wrapper  round  his 
neck,  and  a  sash  to  carry  his  sword.  On  his  head  there  is  an 
enormous  wig,  well  adapted  to  serve  the  purpose  for  which 
Solar  Topees  were  afterwards  invented.  In  his  right  hand  he 
carries  a  sextant,  many  sizes  bigger  than  those  in  modern  use, 
and  at  his  feet  dolphins  sport.  A  grass  lawn  covers  this  court, 
as  well  as  the  other,  and  no  voice  or  sound  ever  comes  from 
any  of  the  houses,  whose  occupants  might  well  be  all  dead. 

"  Mr.  Bunker  turned  to  the  right,  and  presently  rapped  with 
his  knuckles  at  a  door.  Then,  without  waiting  for  a  reply^  he 
turned  the  handle,  and  with  a  nod  invited  his  companion  to 
follow  him.  It  was  a  small  but  well-proportioned  room,  with 
low  ceihng,  furnished  sufficiently.  There  were  clean  white 
curtains  with  rose-coloured  ribbons.  The  window  was  open, 
and  in  it  stood  a  pot  of  mignonette,  now  at  its  best.  At  the 
window  sat,  on  one  side,  an  old  gentleman  with  silvery  white 
hair  and  spectacles,  who  was  reading,  and  on  the  other  side 
a  girl,  with  work  on  her  lap,  was  sewing." 

Angela  had  come  to  announce  that  she  had  taken 
one  of  Mr.  Bunker's  houses  on  Stepney  Green,  and 
was,  as  Mr.  Bunker  put  it,  "  setting  herself  up,  in  a 
genteel  way,  in  the  dressmaking  line,"  and,  want- 
ing hands  to  start  with,  proposed  to  engage  this 
girl,  Captain  Sorensen's  daughter,  as  one  of  her 
employees. 

It  is  not  far  from  the  Trinity  Almshouses  to 
Stepney  Green,  and  facing  Stepney  Green  you  may 
see  what  used  to  be  Mrs.  Bormalack's  boarding- 
house,  where  Angela  lodged,  with  that  spirited, 
democratic  young  man,  Harry  Goslett,  whom  she 
was  ultimately  to  marry,  among  the  boarders. 

"  From  Stepney  Green  to  the  Trinity  Almshouse  is  not  a  long 
way  ;  you  have,  in  fact,  little  more  than  to  pass  through  a 
short  street  and  to  cross  the  road.     But  the  road  itself  is  note- 


j\oL  LA/ID  frtzsef 

f)LACKF/ZIAIZS  . 

"  Then  at  the  etui  of  liankside  they  turn  ofj  into  Holland  Street." 
licsant.     ' '  '/he  Hell  of  St.  I'nul s"  Chaf>tcf  8 


TO  THE  TOWER  145 

worthy  ;  for  of  all  the  roads  which  lead  into  London  or  out  of 
it,  this  of  Whitechapel  is  the  broadest  and  the  noblest  by 
nature.  Man,  it  is  true,  has  done  little  to  embellish  it.  There 
are  no  avenues  of  green  and  spreading  lime  trees  as,  one  day, 
there  shall  be  ;  there  are  no  stately  buildings,  towers,  spires, 
miracles  of  ai^  litecture  ;  but  only  houses  and  shops  which, 
whether  small  or  big,  are  all  alike  mean,  unlovely  and  depressing. 
Yet,  in  spite  of  all,  a  noble  road." 

The  lime  trees  are  there  now  ;  otherwise  the  road 
is  very  much  as  it  was  then.  Cross  it,  and  go  through 
the  short  street,  and  you  are  on  Stepney  Green, 
passing  Mrs.  Bormalack's  boarding-house.  The 
Green  is  "a  small  strip  of  Eden  which  has  been 
visited  by  few  indeed  of  those  who  do  not  live  in 
its  immediate  vicinity." 

"  The  house  was  old,  built  of  red  bricks  with  a  '  shell ' 
decoration  over  the  door.  It  contained  room  for  about  eight 
boarders,  who  had  one  sitting  room  in  common.  .  .  .  There 
are  not  many  places  in  London  where  sunset  does  produce  such 
good  effects  as  at  Stepney  Green.  The  narrow  strip,  so  called, 
in  shape  resembles  too  nearly  a  closed  umbrella  or  a  thickish 
walking-stick;  but  there  are  trees  in  it,  and  beds  of  flowers,  and 
seats  for  those  who  wish  to  sit,  and  walks  for  those  who  wish  to 
walk.  And  the  better  houses  of  the  Green — Bormalack's 
was  on  the  west  or  dingy  side — are  on  the  east,  and  face  the 
setting  sun.  They  are  of  a  good  age,  at  least  a  hundred  and 
fifty  years  old  ;  they  are  built  of  warm  red  brick,  and  some 
have  doors  ornamented  with  the  old-fashioned  shell,  and  all 
have  an  appearance  of  solid  respectability,  which  makes  the 
rest  of  Stepney  proud  of  them.  Here,  in  former  days,  dwelt  the 
aristocracy  of  the  parish  ;  and  on  this  side  was  the  house  taken 
by  Angela  for  her  dressmaking  institution,  the  house  in  which 
her  grandfather  was  born.  The  reason  why  the  sunsets  are 
more  splendid  and  the  sunrises  brighter  at  Stepney  than  at 
the  opposite  end  of  the  town  is  that  the  sun  sets  behind  the 
great  bank  of  cloud  which  for  ever  lies  over  London  town. 


146  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

NoWj  when  he  rises  it  is  naturally  in  the  East,  where  there  is 
no  cloud  of  smoke  to  hide  the  brightness  of  his  face. 

"  The  Green  this  evening  was  crowded  :  it  is  not  so  fashion- 
able a  promenade  as  Whitechapel  Road,  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  it  possesses  the  charm  of  comparative  quiet.  There  is 
no  noise  of  vehicles,  but  only  the  shouting  of  children,  the 
loud  laughter  of  some  gaillard  'prentice,  the  coy  giggle  of  the 
young  lady  to  whom  he  has  imparted  his  latest  merry  jape,  the 
loud  whispers  of  ladies  who  are  exchanging  confidences  about 
their  complaints  and  the  complaints  of  their  friends,  and  the 
musical  laugh  of  girls.  The  old  people  had  all  crept  home  ; 
the  mothers  were  at  home  putting  their  children  to  bed  ;  the 
fathers  were  mostly  engaged  with  the  evening  pipe,  which 
demands  a  chair  within  four  walls  and  a  glass  of  something  ; 
the  Green  was  given  up  to  youth  ;  and  youth  was  principally 
given  up  to  love-making." 

Angela  and  Harry  Goslett  walked  on  the  Green  ; 
they  often  walked  on  it  together  ;  and  here,  and  in 
two  of  the  houses  facing  the  Green — Mrs.  Borma- 
lack's,  and  Angela's  dressmaking  establishment — 
Angela  dreamed  of  building  that  Palace  of  Delight 
which  was  to  provide  the  joyless  multitude  with 
libraries,  reading  rooms,  clubs,  music  rooms,  a  school 
for  music,  and  one  for  dancing,  something,  too,  in 
the  nature  of  a  public  school,  with  lecturers  and 
professors — the  very  Palace  that  she  built  in  the 
book  and  opened  on  the  day  of  her  wedding  ;  the 
very  People's  Palace  that  has  since  come  into  being 
on  the  Mile  End  Road. 

At  Stepney  Church,  an  old,  fourteenth-century 
church  in  the  High  Street,  Angela  married  Harry 
Goslett,  and  revealed  to  him,  after  the  ceremony 
was  over,  when  they  met  a  large  party  of  friends  at 
her  newly-erected  Palace  of  Delight,   that  she  was 


TO  THE  TOWER  147 

not  Angela  Kennedy,  the  mere  dressmaker,  but 
Angela  Messenger,  and  the  richest  heiress  in  England. 
All  about  Bow  Road,  Mile  End  Road,  Whitechapel 
Road,  East  India  Dock  Road,  Limehouse  Church, 
where  Angela  and  Harry  walked  in  the  churchyard 
that  is  now  a  garden,  Bethnal  Green,  Spitalfields 
— all  about  these  and  other  thronged  and  squalid 
neighbourhoods  of  the  East  End,  the  people  of  All 
Sorts  and  Conditions  of  Men  lived  and  worked  and 
wandered,  Angela  sometimes,  in  Bcsant's  favourite 
fashion,  acting  the  cicerone  and  telling  the  others 
about  the  places  they  were  passing  through  ;  but 
we  have  no  time  to  follow  them  further  and  must 
get  back  to  the  I\Iinories,  and  so  to  the  Tower  of 
London.  The  Three  Nuns  Tavern,  across  the  road 
in  Aldgate,  reminds  us  that  all  about  the  Minories 
here,  six  centuries  ago,  were  the  gardens  belonging 
to  an  Abbey  of  nuns.  Not  a  vestige  of  the  gardens 
remains,  and  though  a  few  of  the  byways  are  re- 
miniscent in  their  buildings,  or  their  names  and 
contour,  of  eighteenth  and  seventeenth  century 
London,  only  one  of  them  has  any  peculiar  fasci- 
nation for  me,  and  that  is  Goodman's  Yard,  which, 
in  the  main,  is  the  most  grossly  modernised  of  them 
all.  It  is  little  more  than  a  railway  goods  yard  now, 
a  huge,  dull  brick  railway  building  on  one  side  of  it, 
and  a  row  of  mean  little  old  houses  and  another  old 
Ben  Jonson  tavern  on  the  other.  But  it  draws 
me  to  step  aside  into  it  because  Stow  used  to  come 
this  way  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and  hereabouts 
was  the  stile  he  climbed  to  get  into  Goodman's  field 
and  go  to  Goodman's  farm,  where  he  would  refresh 
himself  with   a   ha'p(;rth    of   milk   before   he   turned 


148  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

to  walk  back  home.  At  the  end  of  the  Minories, 
you  are  on  Tower  Hill,  with  the  grey,  grim,  ancient 
Tower  before  you. 

Quilp  lived  on  Tower  Hill ;  Mrs.  Quilp  had  a  view 
of  the  Tower  from  her  front  window  ;  and  you  may 
choose  for  yourself  which  of  the  queer,  quaint  old 
houses  that  still  topple  along  the  edge  of  that  wide 
sweep  before  the  Tower  is  likeliest  to  have  been  his. 
The  unhappy  Florrie  Holford,  of  Besant's  Bell  of 
St.  Paul's,  came  from  her  lodgings  in  Mansell  Street 
in  an  hour  of  black  despair,  and  flitting  out  by  Thames 
Street,  "  crossed  Tower  Hill ;  on  her  left  rose  up 
the  great  white  Tower,  now  black  in  the  night.  .  .  . 
Beside  the  long  Quay  and  Terrace  of  the  Custom 
House,  which  at  night  is  closed,  there  are  stairs, 
broad  stone  stairs,  with  an  iron  railing  running 
down  them  and  a  little  stone  landing  place  at  the 
top  ;  you  reach  the  stairs  through  iron  gates  in  the 
Street.  In  the  daytime  there  are  boatmen  hanging 
about  ;  survivors  of  the  Thames  watermen.  By 
night  there  is  no  one.  Great  timber  piles  are  stuck 
in  the  bed  of  the  river  just  below  these  stairs,  for 
the  mooring  of  barges,  and  when  the  tide  is  going 
up  or  down  the  water  rushes  boiling,  sucking,  tear- 
ing at  the  timbers  as  if  it  would  gladly  pull  them  up 
and  hurry  them  away  far  out  to  sea.  Hither  she 
came  and  here  she  stood  looking  into  the  water, 
while  the  voice  tempted  and  urged  her  to  plunge 
in  and  make  an  end.  Only  one  little  step  :  no  more 
trouble  :  no  more  misery  :  no  more  tears  :  no  more 
starvation,  rags  and  shame.  Just  one  step :  the 
river,  the  rushing  river,  the  kind  and  merciful  river, 
the  river  of  rest  and  sleep  would  do  the  rest.  .  .  . 


TO  THE  TOWER  149 

No  one  was  on  the  stairs  :  after  dark  no  one  ever 
is  on  those  stairs  ;  she  walked  to  the  head  of  the 
steps,  and  caught  the  iron  rail  and  looked  over." 
But  after  a  struggle  with  herself,  she  resisted  the 
temptation,  and  coming  back  along  Great  Tower 
Hill,  returned  into  Thames  Street,  and  "  went  home 
crying." 

Just  off  Great  Tower  Hill,  in  the  little  public 
garden  that  fringes  the  outside  edge  of  the  moat, 
is  the  site  of  that  scaffold  on  which  so  many  great 
and  famous  rebels,  traitors  and  good  men,  were 
brought  to  the  block.  "  Upon  this  hill,"  says  Stow, 
"  is  always  readily  prepared,  at  the  charges  of  the 
city,  a  large  scaffold  and  gallows  of  timber,  for  the 
execution  of  such  traitors  and  transgressors  as  are 
delivered  out  of  the  Tower,  or  othersvise,  to  the 
sheriffs  of  London  by  writ,  there  to  be  executed." 
Near  by  the  scaffold  stood  the  stocks,  and  in  the 
last  scene  of  Ford's  tragedy  of  Perkin  Warhcck,  a 
constable  and  officers,  followed  by  a  rabble,  bring 
Warbeck  on  to  Tower  Hill  and  fasten  him  in  the 
stocks.  He  is  urged  by  the  King's  Chaplain  to 
confess  that  he  is  an  impostor,  that  he  is  not  of  royal 
blood  and  has  no  rightful  claim  to  the  crown,  but 
this  he  refuses  to  do,  even  to  save  his  life.  Pre- 
sently, his  wife.  Lady  Katherinc,  comes  to  him  there 
with  her  attendants,  and  rebukes  the  Earl  of  Oxford, 
who  would  dissuade  her  from  publicly  acknowledging 
her  degraded  husband  : 

Katherine.  Forbear  me,  sir, 
And  trouble  not  the  current  of  my  duty  ! — 
Oh,  my  lov'd  lord  !  can  any  scorn  be  yours 
In  which  1  have  no  interest  ?  some  kind  hand 


150  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Lend  me  assistance^  that  I  may  partake  -, 

Th'  infliction  of  this  penance.     My  hfe's  dearest, 
Forgive  me  ;  I  have  staid  too  long  from  tend 'ring 
Attendance  on  reproach,  yet  bid  me  welcome. 

Warbeck.  Great  miracle  of  constancy  !   my  miseries 
Were  never  bankrupt  of  their  confidence 
In  worst  afflictions,  till  this — now  I  feel  them. 
Report,  and  thy  deserts,  thou  best  of  creatures. 
Might  to  eternity  have  stood  a  pattern 
For  every  virtuous  wife,  without  this  conquest. 
Thou  hast  outdone  belief ;  yet  may  their  ruin 
In  after  marriages  be  never  pitied 
To  whom  the  story  shall  appear  a  fable  ! 
Why  would'st  thou  prove  so  much  unkind  to  greatness, 
To  glorify  thy  vows  by  such  a  servitude  ? 
I  cannot  weep  ;  but,  trust  me,  dear,  my  heart 
Is  liberal  of  passion  ;  Harry  Richmond, 
A  woman's  faith  hath  robb'd  thy  fame  of  triumph  ! 

Later,  the  sheriff  and  his  ofHcers  arrive  bringing 
four  of  Warbeck's  followers,  with  halters  about 
their  necks,  but  by  then  he  has  been  taken  from 
the  stocks  and  is  being  led  away  himself  to  execution  : 

Oxford.  Look  ye,  behold  your  followers,  appointed 
To  wait  on  you  in  death. 

Warbeck.  Why,  peers  of  England, 

We'll  lead  them  on  courageously  ;  I  read 
A  triumph  over  tyranny  upon 
Their  several  foreheads  .   .   . 
Death  !  pish  !  'tis  but  a  sound,  a  name  of  air  ; 
A  minute's  storm,  or  not  so  much  ;  to  tumble 
From  bed  to  bed,  be  massacred  alive 
By  some  physicians,  for  a  month  or  two, 
In  hope  of  freedom  from  a  fever's  torments, 
Might  stagger  manhood  ;  here  the  pain  is  past 
Ere  sensibly  'tis  felt.     Be  men  of  spirit  ! 


TO  THE  TOWER  151 

Spurn  coward  passion  !  so  illustrious  mention 
Shall  blaze  our  names,  and  style  us  Kings  o'er  death. 

Finally  enters  King  Henry  VH.  to  say  the  word 
that  dismisses  Warbeck  to  his  doom.  Harrison 
Ainsworth  has  a  scene  or  two  on  Tower  Hill,  and 
his  novel,  The  Tower  of  London,  takes  you  all  over 
the  Tower  itself,  but  most  of  his  characters  are  the 
actual  people  of  history,  and  those  that  are  not  are 
too  unreal  and  make  too  faint  an  appeal  to  the 
imagination  to  add  anything  to  the  life  or  interest 
of  the  Tower.  Perkin  Warbeck  was  actual  enough, 
of  course,  but  Ford  recreates  him  and  makes  him 
his  own,  and  it  is  because  Ainsworth  could  never 
do  this  that  I  have  no  clear  recollection  of  his  char- 
acters, and  no  inclination  to  re-read  his  books  and 
renew  my  memories  of  the  men  and  women  of  his 
tales.  Perhaps  it  is  impossible  for  fiction  to  add 
anything  to  the  pathos,  terror,  tragedy  and  glamorous 
romance  of  real  life  that  make  the  Tower  the  most 
ghastly,  the  most  fascinating,  the  most  precious 
of  all  the  relics  we  have  of  bygone  London.  William 
the  Conqueror  is  known  to  have  built  the  beginnings 
of  it  as  a  menace  to  any  rebellious  spirit  that  might 
waken  against  him  among  the  Londoners,  but  there 
is  sufficient  justification  for  Shakespeare's  account 
of  its  origin,  which  is  usually  listed  with  his  inac- 
curacies. In  Richard  III.,  when  Gloucester  pro- 
poses to  Edward,  the  young  Prince  of  Wales,  that 
"  your  highness  shall  repose  you  at  the  Tower," 
the  Prince  remarks, 

I  do  not  like  the  Tower,  of  any  place  ; 

Did  Julius  Caesar  build  thai  place,  my  lord  ? 


152  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  Buckingham  replies, 

He  did,  my  gracious  lord,  begin  that  place, 
Which,  since,  succeeding  ages  have  re-edified, 

the  fact  being  that  the  Romans  had  a  fort  on  the 
same  site  and,  doubtless,  when  the  Conqueror  com- 
menced building  there  he  utilised  what  was  left  of 
it.  Which  was  evidently  Gray's  idea,  too,  when 
he  wrote,  in  The  Bard  : 

Ye  towers  of  Julius,  London's  lasting  shame, 
With  many  a  foul  and  midnight  murder  fed  ! 

So  you  may  take  it  that  the  Tower  has  watched  over 
the  city  since  the  days  when  London  was  nothing 
more  than  a  collection  of  huts  on  the  banks  of  the 
Thames.  In  its  present  aspect  it  has  been  a  familiar 
landmark,  watching  over  London,  for  six  hundred 
years.  Since  the  huddled  streets  and  alleys,  the 
beautiful  palaces,  the  gardens  and  pleasant  old 
houses  of  the  middle-ages  lay  stretched  before  it, 
it  has  seen  London  shifting  and  changing,  like  the 
figures  in  a  kaleidoscope,  through  Tudor,  Stuart, 
Georgian,  Victorian  times,  to  the  vast,  unpicturesque 
but  statelier  city  of  to-day.  It  saw  the  streets  in 
uproar  during  many  a  wild  outbreak  of  the  'pren- 
tices ;  and  when  Jack  Cade,  and  when  Wat  Tyler 
brought  their  conquering  rabble  swarming  into 
them  over  the  bridges  ;  and  when  the  Gordon 
rioters  went  roaring  about  them,  burning  and  pil- 
laging. It  has  seen  the  city  glittering  with  number- 
less royal  and  civic  processions  ;  it  has  seen  it 
desolated  by  the  Great  Plague,  and  swept  by  the 
Great     Fire.      All     the     wonderful,     multi-coloured 


TO  THE  TOWER  153 

history  of  London  has  unrolled  itself  round  the  grim 
walls  of  the  Tower,  and  some  of  the  blackest,  most 
memorable  events  of  it  have  happened  within  them. 
For,  to  say  nothing  of  the  sad  multitude  of  its  lesser 
victims,  it  has  held  in  its  cells  and  dungeons  famous 
men  such  as  Raleigh,  Lord  William  Russell,  the 
Earl  of  Essex,  Sir  Thomas  More  ;  Lord  Nithsdale 
escaped  from  it  ;  the  little  Princes  were  murdered 
in  the  Bloody  Tower ;  from  a  window  over  the 
gateway  of  the  Bloody  Tower  Archbishop  Laud 
leaned  to  bless  Earl  Strafford  as  he  passed  below  on 
his  way  to  execution  ;  in  the  same  Tower  the  brutal 
Judge  Jeffries  was  imprisoned  ;  in  its  Bowyer  Tower 
the  Duke  of  Clarence  was  drowned  in  a  butt  of 
malmsey  ;  and  it  has  numbered  Henry  VL,  Anne 
Boleyn,  Queen  Katherine  and  Lady  Jane  Grey 
among  its  royal  prisoners  ;  the  Duke  of  Monmouth 
lay  waiting  execution  in  the  White  Tower,  in  the 
dungeons  under  which  the  Guy  Fawkcs  conspirators 
were  horribly  tortured  with  the  thumbscrews  and 
the  rack  before  they  passed  out  to  the  scaffold. 
Those  three  Queens  were  beheaded  on  the  scaffold 
within  the  Tower,  the  site  of  which  is  marked  against 
the  chapel  of  St.  Peter  ;  it  was  on  the  scaffold  out- 
side on  Tower  Hill  that  Sir  Thomas  More  went  to 
his  death,  and  Strafford,  Laud,  Monmouth,  Lord 
Lovat,  and  many  another  to  theirs. 

With  all  this  and  so  much  more  of  reality  in  mind, 
one  cannot  make  much  of  the  large  part  that  the 
Tower  has  played  in  fiction,  and  I  shall  linger  only 
over  a  few  such  scenes  that  come  readiest  to  my 
recollection.  Nigel,  Lord  Glenvarloch,  in  Scott's 
Fortunes   of    Nigel,   was   rowed   up   the   river   to   the 


154  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

broad  steps  of  the  Traitor's  Gate  and  carried  a 
prisoner  into  the  Tower.  He  was  shut  in  the  same 
cell  that  had  held  Lady  Jane  Grey,  in  the  Beauchamp 
Tower,  and  amused  himself  for  a  while  in  decipher- 
ing "  the  names,  mottoes,  verses  and  hieroglyphics 
with  which  his  predecessors  in  captivity  had  covered 
the  walls  of  their  prison-house  : 

"  There  he  saw  the  names  of  many  a  forgotten  sufferer 
mingled  with  others  which  will  continue  in  remembrance  until 
English  history  shall  perish.  There  were  the  pious  effusions 
of  the  devout  Catholic,  poured  forth  on  the  eve  of  his  seahng 
his  profession  at  Tyburn,  mingled  with  those  of  the  firm  Pro- 
testant about  to  feed  the  fires  of  Smithfield.  There  the  slender 
hand  of  the  unfortunate  Jane  Grey,  whose  fate  was  to  draw 
tears  from  future  generations,  might  be  contrasted  with  the 
bolder  touch  which  impressed  deep  on  the  walls  the  Bear  and 
Ragged  Staff,  the  proud  emblem  of  the  proud  Dudleys.  It  was 
like  the  roll  of  the  prophet,  a  record  of  lamentation  and  mourn- 
ing, and  yet  not  unmixed  with  brief  interjections  of  resignation, 
and  sentences  expressive  of  the  firmest  resolution." 

You  may  enter  the  cell  and  read  them  for  your- 
self, and  I  think  they  gain  something  of  further 
interest,  not  from  Nigel's  association,  but  from  the 
fact  that  Scott  once  stood  here  and  read  them,  too, 
and  went  away  to  create  Nigel  and  put  him  in  this 
prison,  and  enact  in  it  that  scene  with  Master  Heriot, 
the  Lombard  Street  goldsmith,  and  the  Fleet  Street 
clockmaker's  daughter,  Margaret  Ramsay.  Loving 
Nigel  in  secret,  she  had  followed  him  dressed  as  a 
page  to  warn  him  he  was  in  danger  of  arrest,  was 
captured  and  thrown  into  this  same  dungeon  with 
him  and  lay  exhausted  on  the  floor  with  her  cloak 
wrapped  about  her,  till  Master  Heriot  came  and, 
snatching   it   away,   revealed  her  identity   and   was 


TO  THE  TOWER  155 

with  difficulty  persuaded  that  Nigel  had  not  until 
then  been  aware  of  it. 

Tom  Taylor  has  a  scene  of  his  'Twixt  Axe  and 
Crown,  in  the  Lieutenant's  Lodging  in  the  Tower, 
and  another,  a  better  one,  in  the  Lieutenant's  Garden. 
Here  Sir  Thomas  Wyatt,  condemned  for  fomenting 
rebellion  against  Queen  Mary  on  behalf  of  the  Lady 
Elizabeth,  is 

Brought  round 
By  the  Byward  Tower  and  Postern  to  Tower  Hill, 

to  pay  the  price  of  his  treason.  And  again,  in  his 
historical  drama  of  Anne  Boleyn,  Tom  Taylor  has 
his  last  scene  in  the  Presence  Chamber  in  the  Tower, 
where  Anne  Boleyn  bids  farewell  to  her  waiting- 
women  and  asks  them  to  tell  the  King  : 

For  my  death, 
I  pray  God  pardon  his  great  sin  therein, 
And  all  my  enemies,  its  instruments. 
And  tell  the  King,  too,  he  hath  still  been  constant 
In  heaping  honours  on  this  head  of  mine — 
From  simple  maid  he  made  me  Marchioness  ; 
From  state  of  Marchioness  raised  me  to  Queen  ; 
And  now  he  hath  no  higher  earthly  crown 
He  crowns  my  innocence  with  martyrdom.   .   .   . 
'Twas  hence  I  set  forth  for  my  coronation  ; 
All  is  as  it  was  then — only  a  Queen 
Who  goes  to  take  a  higher  crown  than  England's. 

Two  scenes  of  Ford's  Perkin  Warbeck  are  inside 
the  Tower  ;  but  no  imaginative  writer  is  so  closely 
identified  with  it  as  Shakespeare.  It  is  in  Richard  11. 
that  you  have  Richard's  Queen  waiting  with  her 
Ladies  in  "  a  street  leading  to  the  Tower  "  to  see 
the   King,   who  has   been   deposed   by   Bolingbroke, 


156  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

go  by  on  his  road  to  prison.  "  This  way,"  she 
says  : 

This  way  the  king  will  come  ;  this  is  the  way 
To  Julius  Csesar's  ill-erected  tower, 
To  whose  flint  bosom  my  condemned  lord 
Is  doomed  a  prisoner  by  proud  Bolingbroke, 
Here  let  us  rest,  if  this  rebellious  earth 
Have  any  resting  for  her  true  king's  queen  ; 

and  here  presently,  under  the  walls  of  the  Tower, 
she  and  Richard  say  a  last  farewell  to  each  other. 
Into  a  room  of  the  Tower,  in  Henry  VI.,  Mortimer 
is  carried  by  two  of  his  gaolers,  and  begs  them  to 
set  him  down  there  : 

Kind  keepers  of  my  weak  decaying  age, 
Let  dying  Mortimer  here  rest  himself, 
Even  like  a  man  new  haled  from  the  rack. 
So  fare  my  limbs  with  long  imprisonment ; 
And  these  grey  locks,  the  pursivants  of  death, 
Nestor-like  aged,  in  an  age  of  care, 
Argue  the  end  of  Edmund  Mortimer. 

He  had  conspired  for  the  crown  and  failed,  and  so 
had  spent  most  of  his  life  uselessly  in  prison  ;  he 
has  sent  now  for  his  nephew,  Richard  Plantagenet, 
who  comes  from  the  Temple  to  see  him,  is  by  him 
when  he  dies,  and  says  his  fitting  epitaph  over  him  : 

Here  dies  the  dusky  torch  of  Mortimer, 
Choked  with  ambition  of  the  meaner  sort. 

In  the  second  part  of  the  same  play,  you  have  the 
citizens  gathered  by  the  Tower,  whilst  Jack  Cade's 
conquering  mob  overruns  London,  and  Lord  Scales 
appears  on  the  walls  to  ask  for  news  : 


TO  THE  TOWER  157 

Scales.  How  now  !     Is  Jack  Cade  slain  ? 

First  Citizen.  No,  my  lord,  nor  likely  to  be  slain  ;  for  they 
have  won  the  bridge,  killing  all  those  that  withstand  them. 
The  Lord  Mayor  craves  aid  of  your  honour  from  the  Tower,  to 
defend  the  city  from  the  rebels. 

Scales.  Such  aid  as  I  can  spare  you  shall  command  ; 
But  I  am  troubled  here  with  them  myself  ; 
The  rebels  have  assayed  to  win  the  Tower. 
But  get  you  to  Smithfield  and  gather  head. 
And  thither  I  will  send  you  Matthew  Goffe  : 
Fight  for  your  king,  your  countr}',  and  your  lives. 

But  the  play  in  which  the  Tower  bulks  largest  is 
Richard  III.,  with  the  great  scene  in  which  Clarence 
is  stabbed  and  his  body  haled  out  to  be  flung  into 
the  malmsey-butt  ;  and  that  scene,  as  great  and 
subtler,  where  Richard  comes  to  join  the  Council 
sitting  in  the  Tower,  sends  the  Bishop  of  Ely  away 
on  a  trivial  errand — 

My  Lord  of  Ely,  when  I  was  last  in  Holborn, 
I  saw  good  strawberries  in  your  garden  there  ; 
I  do  beseech  you  send  for  some  of  them, — 

and  orders  the  sudden  arrest  of  one  of  his  opponents, 
Lord  Hastings  : 

Thou  art  a  traitor  : 
Off  with  his  head  !     Now,  by  Saint  Paul,  I  swear, 
I  will  not  dine  until  I  see  the  same, 
Lovel  and  Ratcliff,  look  that  it  be  done  : 
The  rest,  that  love  me,  rise,  and  follow  me, 

and  so  leaves  Hastings  to  lament  his  own  lack  of 
caution  : 

Woe,  woe,  for  England  !  not  a  whit  for  me  ; 
For  I,  too  fond,  might  have  prevented  this. 


158  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Stanley  did  dream  the  boar  did  raze  his  helm  ; 
And  I  did  scorn  it^  and  disdained  to  fly. 
Three  times  to-day  my  foot-cloth  horse  did  stumble. 
And  startled  when  he  looked  upon  the  Tower, 
As  loath  to  bear  me  to  the  slaughter-house.  .  .  . 

Ratcltff.  Come,   come,  dispatch ;    the  duke   would   be 
at  dinner : 
Make  a  short  shrift,  he  longs  to  see  your  head. 

Hastings.  O  momentary  grace  of  mortal  man, 
Which  we  more  hunt  for  than  the  grace  of  God  ! 

There  is  a  scene  on  the  Tower  walls  in  which  Glou- 
cester and  Buckingham  are  scheming  for  the  murder 
of  the  young  princes  who  stand  between  Gloucester 
and  the  throne  ;  and  a  scene  outside  the  Tower  in 
which  Queen  Elizabeth,  the  mother  of  the  princes, 
comes  with  others,  bent  upon  seeing  them  and  is 
refused  admittance,  and  forced  at  last  to  go  away 
full  of  forebodings  : 

Stay  yet,  look  back  with  me  unto  the  Tower. 
Pity,  you  ancient  stones,  those  tender  babes 
Whom  envy  hath  immured  within  your  wails. 
Rough  cradle  for  such  little  pretty  ones  ! 
Rude  ragged  nurse,  old  sullen  playfellow 
For  tender  princes,  use  my  babies  well. 
So  foolish  sorrow  bids  your  stones  farewell. 

Surely,  as  Gray  said,  this  Tower  has  been  the 
shame  of  London,  but  Time  lays  such  a  magical, 
transforming  hand  on  the  sins  and  shames  and  bar- 
barisms of  yesterday  that  it  is  now  its  glory  too. 
The  folly  of  those  kings  of  ours  was  larger  even  than 
their  crimes — that  any  one  of  them  should  think 
it  worth  while  to  waste  his  days  in  mean  schemings 
to  slaughter  other  kings  and  their  children  that  he 
might  wear  a  crown  and  carry  a  sceptre  for  such  a 


TO  THE  TOWER  159 

very  little  while — the  thing  is  too  childish  for  any- 
thing but  pity  ;  they  were  each  so  soon  and  so  com- 
pletely done  with  it.  They  are  all  gone,  and  nothing 
abides  with  us  but  the  story  of  their  brutal  littleness, 
and  the  shadow  of  the  misery,  the  sufferings,  the 
heart-break  of  their  victims,  which  fills  the  grim 
old  Tower  for  ever  with  a  whisper  of  tears  and  sigh- 
ings,  and  clothes  it  with  a  furtive,  sinister,  haunted 
air,  so  that  it  is  alienated  from  its  human  neigh- 
bourhood and  looks  strangely  dark  and  cold  even 
in  the  sunlight. 

It  is  pleasant,  none  the  less,  to  think  how  Shake- 
speare must  have  walked  through  its  gloomy  chambers 
and  up  its  narrow,  twisted  stair\\'ays,  and  how  it 
must  have  lured  nearly  all  our  great  English  writers 
into  visiting  it,  from  Chaucer,  who  lived  within 
sight  of  its  gaunt  walls,  to  Scott,  Dickens,  Thackeray, 
Browning  (who  has  a  scene  of  Strafford  in  it),  and 
Tennyson  (who  has  talk  of  it  in  his  Queen  Mary)  ; 
and  that  when  you  go  in  at  the  gate  on  Great  Tower 
Hill  you  are  treading  in  their  footsteps. 


CHAPTER  VII 

BY  THE   THAMES,   AND   UP  THE   MONUMENT 

I  HAVE  no  interest  in  Tower  Street,  except  to 
remember  that  "  Simon  Eyre,  the  mad  shoemaker 
of  Tower  Street  "  lived  there,  and  some  of  the  scenes 
of  Dekker's  Shoemaker' s  Holiday  are  laid  in  and 
about  his  shop  ;  and  nothing  need  stay  us  in  East- 
cheap  till  we  come  to  the  city  end  of  it.  Eastcheap, 
according  to  the  invaluable  Stow,  "  was  always 
famous  for  its  convivial  doings.  The  cookes  cried 
hot  ribbes  of  beef  roasted,  pies  well  baked,  and  other 
victuals  ;  there  was  clattering  of  pewter  pots,  harps, 
pipe  and  sawtrie  ;  "  and  you  find  an  echo  of  this 
in  Dekker  where,  food  running  short  at  his  banquet, 
Simon  Eyre  cries  out  to  his  assistants,  "  Firk,  Hodge, 
lame  Ralph,  run,  my  tall  men,  beleaguer  the  shambles, 
beggar  all  Eastcheap,  serve  me  whole  oxen  in 
chargers,  and  let  sheep  whine  upon  the  tables  like 
pigs  for  want  of  good  fellows  to  eat  them  !  "  Now- 
adays the  street  is  a  very  modern  business  thorough- 
fare, and  no  more  noticeably  given  over  to  the 
culinary  graces  than  most  of  its  neighbours.  I 
like  it  partly  because  one  day,  about  a  century  ago, 
Washington  Irving  walked  along  it  as  we  are  going 
now,  and  chiefly  because  the  Boar's  Head  stood  in 
Eastcheap  and  was  kept  by  Mistress  Quickly  and 
frequented   by   Falstaff   and   his   boon   companions. 

160 


1" 


?^:M^rT^-    


'"■  -.Fr  i  lil;  MSB 


^.^S^y^ 


.^^..::^. 


i1/7-.  ^^^«  "ir/n/ir,;/  intn  the  nioii/ifv  little  filnntntion,  or  cat  fiirsei-iT  of  Clifford's 
liin,  ftx  it  vns  that  day,  in  search  oj  a  suggestion." 

Chapter  to 


BY  THE  THAMES  161 

Washington  Irving  came  to  look  for  it,  but  it  was 
swept  away  in  the  Great  Fire,  and  he  saw  only  the 
already  ancient  house  that  had  succeeded  to  its  site 
and  was  tenanted  by  an  Irish  hairdresser.  We 
shall  see  less  of  it  than  that,  for  the  end  of  East- 
cheap  was  cut  away  when  King  William  Street  was 
made,  and  the  statue  of  that  King,  erected  in  the 
middle  of  the  road,  facing  London  Bridge,  marks 
almost  the  exact  spot  where  the  Boar's  Head  used 
to  stand.  Wherefore  this  is  another  statue  I  would 
have  taken  away  to  some  equally  unsuitable  posi- 
tion, that  it  might  be  fittingly  replaced  by  a  statue 
of  Falstaff,  with  a  mighty  pedestal  that  should  carry 
a  medallion  portrait  of  Shakespeare  and  be  panelled 
with  some  of  those  immortal  scenes  that  had  the 
Boar's  Head  for  their  background.  It  was  there 
that  Falstaff  told  and  acted  to  the  Prince  and  Poins 
the  great  story  of  his  own  Homeric  fighting,  when 
he  and  Bardolph  and  Peto  attacked  the  travellers 
on  Gadshill ;  it  was  thence  that  Falstaff  set  forth 
to  take  charge  of  his  command  of  foot,  and  march 
with  the  Prince  to  put  down  rebellion — but  I  shall 
not  attempt  any  dull  catalogue  of  all  Falstaff' s  doings 
at  the  Boar's  Head,  his  wit-combats  with  the  Prince, 
his  revcllings  with  Bardolph,  his  dallyings  with 
Doll  Tearshcet,  his  quarrelings  with  Dame  Quickly 
— all  the  life  and  talk  and  lusty  humour  that 
have  made  the  inn  as  famous  in  its  different  fashion 
as  the  Cheapside  Mermaid.  If  I  were  put  to  it  to 
name  the  passage  in  Shakespeare  that  touches  me 
most  by  its  utter  naturalness  and  the  poignancy 
of  its  mingled  pathos  and  humour  I  should  name  that 
which  tells  of  the  death  of  Falstaff.     Like   Falstaff 


162  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

himself  it  is  one  of  the  greatest  things  in  all  litera- 
ture, and  makes  me  want  to  delay  here  and  fancy 
the  Boar's  Head  back  into  its  place  again  and 
Bardolph,  Nym  and  Ancient  Pistol  (now  mine 
Hostess's  husband)  lingering  on  the  footway  before 
it,  making  ready  to  go  and  join  the  King's  forces 
at  Southampton  with  Mistress  Quickly  and  the 
Boy,  out  there  also,  to  see  them  start  : 

Hostess.  Prithee,  honey-sweet  husband,  let  me  bring  thee 
to  Staines. 

Pistol.  No ;  for  my  manly  heart  doth  yearn.  Bardolph, 
be  blithe  ;  Nym,  rouse  thy  vaunting  veins  ;  Boy,  bristle  thy 
courage  up  ;  for  Falstaff  he  is  dead,  and  we  must  yearn 
therefore. 

Bardolph.  Would  I  were  with  him,  wheresome'er  he  is, 
either  in  heaven  or  hell  ! 

Hostess.  Nay,  sure,  he's  not  in  hell :  he's  in  Arthur's  bosom, 
if  ever  man  went  to  Arthur's  bosom.  A'  made  a  finer  end  and 
went  away  an  it  had  been  any  christon  child  ;  a'  parted  even 
just  between  twelve  and  one,  even  at  the  turning  o'  the  tide  : 
for  after  I  saw  him  fumble  with  the  sheets  and  play  with  flowers 
and  smile  upon  his  fingers'  ends,  I  knew  there  was  but  one  way  ; 
for  his  nose  was  as  sharp  as  a  pen,  and  a'  babbled  of  green 
fields.  '  How  now,  Sir  John  ! '  quoth  I :  '  what  man  !  be  of 
good  cheer.'  So  a'  cried  out  '  God,  God,  God,'  three  or  four 
times  :  now  I,  to  comfort  him,  bid  him  a'  should  not  think  of 
God,  I  hoped  there  was  no  need  to  trouble  himself  with  any 
such  thoughts  yet.  So  a'  bade  me  lay  more  clothes  on  his  feet : 
I  put  my  hand  into  the  bed  and  felt  them,  and  they  were  as 
cold  as  any  stone  ;  then  I  felt  to  his  knees,  and  so  upward,  and 
upward,  and  all  was  as  cold  as  any  stone. 

Nym.  They  say  he  cried  out  of  sack. 

Hostess.  Ay,  that  a'  did. 

Bardolph.  And  of  women. 

Hostess.  Nay,  that  a'  did  not. 


BY  THE  THAMES  163 

Boy.  Yes,  that  a'  did ;  and  said  they  were  devils 
incarnate. 

Hostess.  A'  could  never  abide  carnation  ;  'twas  a  colour 
he  never  liked. 

Boy.  A'  said  once,  the  devil  would  have  him  about  women. 

Hostess.  A'  did  in  some  sort  handle  women  ;  but  then  he 
was  rheumatic,  and  talked  of  the  whore  of  Babylon. 

Boy.  Do  you  not  remember  a'  saw  a  flea  slick  upon  Bar- 
dolph's  nose,  and  a'  said  it  was  a  black  soul  burning  in 
hell-fire  ? 

Bardolph.  Well,  the  fuel  is  gone  that  maintained  that  fire  : 
that's  all  the  riches  I  got  in  his  service. 

Nym.  Shall  we  shog  ?  the  king  will  be  gone  from  South- 
ampton. 

Pistol.  Come,  let's  away. 

So  they  went,  and  are  gone,  and  you  look  up,  and 
see  where  they  had  stood,  with  the  Boar's  Head 
behind  them,  this  unsatisfying  statue  of  King 
William  IV. 

A  httle  way  westward,  up  Cannon  Street,  is 
London  Stone,  another  Shakespeare  association, 
this  time  a  still  visible  one.  An  old,  old,  worn  block, 
it  is  shut,  for  protection  against  vandal  hands,  in 
a  casing  of  stone,  with  iron  bars  across  the  front, 
against  the  wall  of  St.  S within 's  church.  It  has 
been  there  smce  the  time  of  the  Romans,  and  is 
supposed  to  have  been  erected  by  them  "  as  a 
miliary,  like  that  in  the  Forum  at  Rome,  from 
whence  all  the  distances  were  measured."  The 
usual  disputes  are  going  on  among  antiquarians 
as  to  whether  this  was  its  purpose,  but  they  do  not 
concern  us  ;  what  does  concern  us  is  that  Shake- 
speare placed  hereabouts  a  brief  scene  of  the  fourth 
act  of  Henry  VI.  : 


164  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Scene  VI. 

London.    Cannon  Street. 

Enter  Jack  Cade  and  his  Followers.     He  strikes  his  staff  on 

London  Stone. 

Cade.  Now  is  Mortimer  lord  of  this  city.  And  here,  sitting 
upon  London  Stone,  I  charge  and  command  that,  of  the  city's 
cost,  the  conduit  run  nothing  but  claret  wine  this  first  year  of 
our  reign.  And  now,  henceforward,  it  shall  be  treason  for  any 
that  calls  me  other  than  Lord  Mortimer. 

Enter  a  Soldier,  running. 

Soldier.  Jack  Cade  !    Jack  Cade  ! 

Cade.  Knock  him  down  there.  \They  kill  him. 

Smith.  If  this  fellow  be  wise,  he'll  never  call  you  Jack  Cade 
more  ;  I  think  he  hath  a  very  fair  warning. 

Dick.  My  lord,  there  is  an  army  gathered  together  in  Smith- 
field. 

Cade.  Come  then,  let's  go  fight  with  them.  But  first,  go  and 
set  London  bridge  on  fire,  and,  if  you  can,  burn  down  the  Tower 
too.     Come,  let's  away.  {Exeunt. 

Jack  Cade  was  not  that  sort  of  man ;  Shake- 
speare mahgned  him  as  all  the  historians  used  to  ; 
but  he  had  the  warrant  of  Holinshed's  Chronicle 
for  making  Cade  strike  London  Stone  and  declare 
himself  Lord  of  the  City ;  and  whether,  being  roused 
by  intolerable  wrongs  to  lead  the  poor  to  fight  for 
their  bare  rights,  he  was,  in  any  case,  a  worse  man 
than  those  kings  who,  in  pursuit  of  their  mean  private 
ambitions,  turned  the  Tower  into  a  shambles,  is  a 
point  that  each  of  us  can  decide  for  himself. 

"  Come,  sergeant,"  says  Philip,  in  Webster's 
Northward  Ho  !  when  he  is  arrested  in  a  tavern  for 
debt,  "  ni  step  to  my  uncle,  not  far  off,  in  Pudding 
Lane,  and  he  shall  bail  me."  We  are  not  going 
back  to  Pudding  Lane  for  that  or  any  other  purpose, 


BY  THE  THAMES  165 

but  it  runs  into  Monument  Yard,  just  out  of  East- 
cheap,  and  we  are  going  back  there  for  the  sake  of 
the   Monument.     The  Great  Fire   broke   out   at   the 
shop  of  the  King's  baker  in  Pudding  Lane,  and  the 
Monument    was    built    to    commemorate    it.     Shift, 
the  society  entertainer  of  Foote's  farce,  The  Minor, 
had  an  engagement  at  the  house  of  an  impossible 
"  Mr.    Deputy    Sugarsops,    near    the    Monument  ;  " 
and  Todgers's  Commercial  Boarding  House,  whence 
Mr.  Pecksniff  lodged  was  in  "  a  kind  of  paved  yard 
near  the  Monument,"  but  that  yard  and  the  houses 
in  it  were  demolished  a  few  years  ago,  though  if  you 
wander  round  by  Love  Lane  and  the  adjacent  by- 
ways you  may  still  see  houses  that  were  coeval  with 
Todgers's  and  as  like  it  as  if  they  belonged  to   the 
same    family.     But    the    Monument    itself,    as    well 
as   Todgei^s's,    comes    into    Martin    Chuzzlewit ;     and 
the  Monument  is  happily  with  us  yet. 

When  Tom  Pinch  came  to  London,  he  started 
out  one  morning  to  walk  to  Furnival's  Inn  ;  with 
the  countryman's  distnist  of  Londoners,  he  would 
not  ask  to  be  directed,  so  lost  his  way  and  strayed 
off  into  Barbican,  into  London  Wall,  got  somehow 
into  Thames  Street,  and  "  found  himself  at  last 
hard  by  the  Monument. 

"  The  Man  in  the  Monument  was  quite  as  mysterious  a  being 
to  Tom  as  the  Man  in  the  Moon.  It  im.medialely  occurred  to 
him  that  the  lonely  creature  who  held  himself  aloof  from  all 
mankind  in  that  pillar,  like  some  old  hermit,  was  the  very  man 
of  whom  to  ask  his  way.  Cold  he  mif^ht  be  ;  little  sympathy  he 
had,  perhaps,  with  human  passion — the  column  seemed  too 
tall  for  that ;  but  if  Truth  didn't  live  in  the  base  of  the  Monu- 
ment, notwithstanding  Pope'i  couplet  about  the  outside  of  it. 


166  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

where  in  London  (Tom  thought)  was  she  likely  to  be  found  ! 
Coming  close  below  the  pillar^  it  was  a  great  encouragement  to 
Tom  to  find  that  the  Man  in  the  Monument  had  simple  tastes  ; 
that  stony  and  artificial  as  his  residence  was^  he  still  preserved 
some  rustic  recollections  ;  that  he  liked  plants,  hung  up  bird- 
cages, was  not  wholly  cut  off  from  fresh  groundsel,  and  kept 
young  trees  in  tubs.  The  Man  in  the  Monument  himself  was 
sitting  outside  the  door — his  own  door — the  Monument  door  : 
what  a  grand  idea  ! — and  was  actually  yawning,  as  if  there  were 
no  Monument  to  stop  his  mouth  and  give  him  a  perpetual 
interest  in  his  own  existence. 

"  Tom  was  advancing  towards  this  remarkable  creature  to 
inquire  the  way  to  Furnival's  Inn,  when  two  people  came  to  see 
the  Monument.  They  were  a  gentleman  and  a  lady  ;  and  the 
gentleman  said,  '  How  much  apiece  ?  ' 

"  The  Man  in  the  Monument  replied,  '  A  Tanner.' 

"  It  seemed  a  low  expression,  compared  with  the  Monument. 
The  gentleman  put  a  shilling  in  his  hand,  and  the  Man  in  the 
Monument  opened  a  dark  little  door.  When  the  gentleman 
and  lady  had  passed  out  of  view,  he  shut  it  again,  and  came 
slowly  back  to  his  chair.     He  sat  down  and  laughed. 

"  '  They  don't  know  what  a-many  steps  there  is  ! '  he  said. 
'  It's  worth  twice  the  money  to  stop  here.     Oh,  my  eye  ! ' 

"  The  man  in  the  Monument  was  a  Cynic  ;  a  worldly  man  ! 
Tom  couldn't  ask  his  way  of  him.  He  was  prepared  to  put  no 
confidence  in  anything  he  said. 

"  '  My  Gracious  ! '  cried  a  well-known  voice  behind  Mr 
Pinch.     '  Why,  to  be  sure  it  is  ! ' 

"  At  the  same  time  he  was  poked  in  the  back  by  a  parasol. 
Turning  round  to  inquire  into  this  salute,  he  beheld  the  eldest 
daughter  of  his  late  patron. 

"  '  Miss  Pecksniff  ! '  said  Tom. 

"  '  Why,  my  Goodness,  Mr  Pinch  ! '  cried  Cherry.  '  What 
are  you  doing  here  ?  '  " 

Cherry  and  her  sister,  Mercy,  had  fallen  out  with 
Mr.  Pecksniff,  for  the  nonce,  because  they  suspected 
him  of    designs   to  marry  again  ;    the  two  of  them 


BY  THE  THAMES  167 

were  staying  in  London  at  Todgers's,  and  after  some 
demur  Tom  consented  to  accompany  her  to  the 
Boarding  House  and  have  a  chat  with  her  and  her 
sister  before  he  resumed  his  search  for  Fumival's  Inn, 
which  makes  it  all  the  more  regrettable  that  Todgers's 
should  have  been  wiped  out  of  existence. 

Mr.  Van  den  Bosch,  grandfather  of  the  pretty  Lydia 
of  The  Virginians,  had  his  house  in  Monument  Yard  ; 
and  when  David  Copperfield  returned  to  England 
after  his  three  years  of  wandering  abroad,  he  "  landed 
in  London  on  a  wintry  autumn  evening.  It  was  dark 
and  raining,  and  I  saw  more  fog  and  mud  in  a  minute 
than  I  had  seen  in  a  year.  I  walked  from  the  Custom 
House  to  the  Monument  before  I  found  a  coach  ;  " 
and  as  the  coach  took  him  on  from  the  Monument 
he  looked  out  of  the  window  "  and  observed  that  an 
old  house  on  Fish  Street  Hill,  which  had  stood  un- 
touched by  the  painter,  carpenter  or  bricklayer  for 
a  century,  had  been  pulled  down  in  my  absence." 
But  I  know  of  only  one  novel  that  takes  you  up  the 
Monument  and  gives  you  a  scene  on  the  top  of  it. 
This  is  Gissing's  In  the  Year  of  Jubilee.  Luckworth 
Crewe  is  an  energetic,  ambitious  young  man  of 
business  ;  he  has  been  paying  attentions  to  Nancy 
Lord,  but  Nancy  too  is  ambitious  and  in  no  hurry  to 
give  herself  to  any  man  all  for  love,  and  has  held  him 
off  discreetly.  She  had  once  taken  a  walk  with  him, 
and  at  length  he  reminds  her  that  she  had  promised 
him  another.  He  mentions  that  he  recently  took 
some  friends  up  the  Monument  and  St.  Paul's  ;  she 
remarks  that  she  has  never  seen  the  Monument,  and 
is  brought  to  consent  to  meet  him  next  afternoon  at 
the  north  end  of  London  Bridge.     They  meet  there, 


168  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  after  some  talk  he  says  he  will  take  her  to  see 
his  business  premises  in  Farringdon  Street. 

"  '  We'll  walk  round  when  we've  been  up  the  Monument. 
You  don't  often  go  about  the  City,  I  daresay.  Nothing  doing, 
of  course,  on  a  Saturday  afternoon.' 

"  Nancy  made  him  moderate  his  pace,  which  was  too  quick 
for  her.  .  .  . 

"  '  I  shall  live  in  a  big  way,'  Crewe  continued,  as  they  walked 
on  towards  Fish  Street  Hill.  '  Not  for  the  swagger  of  it ;  I 
don't  care  about  that,  but  because  I've  a  taste  for  luxury. 
I  shall  have  a  country  house,  and  keep  good  horses.  And  I 
should  like  to  have  a  little  farm  of  my  own,  a  model  farm  ; 
make  my  own  butter  and  cheese,  and  know  that  I  ate  the 
real  thing.  I  shall  buy  pictures.  Haven't  I  told  you  I  like 
pictures  ?  Oh,  yes.  I  shall  go  round  among  the  artists,  and 
encourage  talent  that  hasn't  made  itself  known.' 

"  '  Can  you  recognise  it  ?  '  asked  Nancy. 

"  '  Well,  I  shall  learn  to.  And  I  shall  have  my  wife's  portrait 
painted  by  some  first-rate  chap,  never  mind  what  it  costs,  and 
hung  in  the  Academy.  That's  a  great  idea  of  mine — to  see 
my  wife's  portrait  in  the  Academy.  .  .  .  Well,  here  we  are. 
People  used  to  be  fond  of  going  up  there,  they  say,  just  to  pitch 
themselves  down.  A  good  deal  of  needless  trouble,  it  seems  to 
me.  Perhaps  they  gave  themselves  the  off-chance  of  changing 
their  minds  before  they  got  to  the  top.' 

"  '  Or  wanted  to  see  if  life  looked  any  better  from  up  there/ 
suggested  Nancy. 

"  '  Or  hoped  somebody  would  catch  them  by  the  coat-tails, 
and  settle  a  pension  on  them  out  of  pity.' 

"  Thus  jesting  they  began  the  ascent.  Crewe,  whose  spirits 
were  at  high  pressure,  talked  all  the  way  up  the  winding  stairs  ; 
on  issuing  into  daylight,  he  became  silent,  and  they  stood  side 
by  side,  mute,  before  the  vision  of  London's  immensity.  Nancy 
began  to  move  round  the  platform.  The  strong  west  wind 
lashed  her  cheeks  to  a  glowing  colour ;  excitement  added 
brilliancy  to  her  eyes.  As  soon  as  they  had  recovered  from  the 
first  impression^  this  spectacle  of  a  world's  wonder  served  only 


BY  THE  THAMES  169 

to  exhilarate  her  ;  she  was  not  awed  by  what  she  looked  upon. 
In  her  conceit  of  self-importance^  she  stood  there,  above  the 
battling  millions  of  men,  proof  against  mystery  and  dread, 
untouched  by  the  voices  of  the  past,  and  in  the  present  seeing 
only  common  things,  though  from  an  odd  point  of  view.  Here 
her  senses  seemed  to  make  the  literal  assumption  by  which  her 
mind  had  always  been  directed  :  that  she — Nancy  Lord — 
was  the  mid  point  of  the  universe.  No  humility  awoke  in  her  ; 
she  felt  the  stirring  of  en\aes,  avidities,  unavowable  passions, 
and  let  them  flourish  unrebuked. 

"  Crewe  had  liis  eyes  fixed  upon  her  ;  his  lips  parted  hungrily. 

"  '  Now  that's  how  I  should  like  to  see  you  painted,'  he 
said  all  at  once.  '  Just  like  that  !  I  never  saw  you  looking  so 
well.  I  believe  you're  the  most  beautiful  girl  to  be  found 
anywhere  in  this  London.' 

"  There  was  genuine  emotion  in  his  voice,  and  his  sweeping 
gesture  suited  the  mood  of  her  vehemence.  Nancy,  having 
seen  that  the  two  or  three  other  people  on  the  platform  were 
not  within  hearing,  gave  an  answer  of  which  the  frankness 
surprised  even  herself. 

"  '  Portraits  for  the  Academy  cost  a  good  deal,  you  know.' 

"  '  I  know.  But  that's  what  I'm  working  for.  There  are 
not  many  men  down  yonder,'  he  pointed  over  the  City,  '  have 
a  better  head  for  money-making  than  I  have.' 

"  '  Well,  prove  it,'  replied  Nancy,  and  laughed  as  the  wind 
caught  her  breath. 

"  '  How  long  will  you  give  me  ?  ' 

"  She  made  no  answer,  but  walked  to  the  side  whence  she 
could  look  westward.  Crewe  followed  close,  his  features  set 
still  in  the  hungry  look,  his  eyes  never  moving  from  her  warm 
cheek  and  full  lips. 

"  '  What  it  must  be,'  she  said,  '  to  have  twenty  thousand 
a  year ! ' 

"  The  man  of  business  gave  a  gasp.  In  the  same  moment 
he  had  to  clutch  at  his  hat,  lest  it  should  be  blown  away. 

"  '  Twenty  thousand  a  year  ?  '  he  echoed.  '  Well,  it  isn't 
impossible.  Men  get  beyond  that,  and  a  good  deal  beyond 
it.     But  it's  a  large  order.' 


170  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  '  Of  course  it  is.  But  what  was  it  you  said  ?  The  most 
beautiful  girl  in  all  London  ?  That's  a  large  order^  too,  is'nt 
it  ?     How  much  is  she  worth  ?  ' 

"  '  You're  talking  for  the  joke  now/  said  Crewe.  '  I  don't 
like  to  hear  that  kind  of  thing,  either.  You  never  think  in 
that  way.' 

"  '  My  thoughts  are  my  own.     I  may  think  as  I  choose.' 

*'  '  Yes.     But  you  have  thoughts  above  money.' 

"  '  Have  I  ?  How  kind  of  you  to  say  so. — I've  had  enough 
of  this  wind  ;  we'll  go  down.' 

"  She  led  the  way,  and  neither  of  them  spoke  till  they  were 
in  the  street  again.     Nancy  felt  her  hair. 

"  '  Am  I  blown  to  pieces  ?  '  she  asked. 

"  *  No,  no  ;  you're  all  right.  Now,  will  you  walk  through 
the  City  ?  ' 

"  '  Where's  the  place  you  spoke  of  ?  ' 

"  '  Farringdon  Street.  That'll  bring  you  round  to  Black- 
friars  Bridge,  when  you  want  to  go  home.  But  there's  plenty 
of  time  yet.'  " 

Fish  Street  Hill  slopes  down  into  Lower  Thames 
Street,  and  leftward  lie  Billingsgate  Market,  and  be- 
yond it  the  Custom  House,  at  which  young  Scatterall, 
in  Trollope's  Three  Clerks,  yearned  to  secure  an 
appointment  because  "  one  does  get  such  stunning 
feeds  for  tenpence  at  that  place  in  Thames  Street  " — 
the  Custom  House  from  which  David  Copperfield 
walked  to  the  Monument,  and  to  the  steps  of  which 
Cowper  once  went  with  the  intention  of  committing 
suicide,  but  was  baulked  by  the  sight  of  a  porter 
sitting  on  some  goods  there,  and  went  back  to  the 
coach  he  had  left  at  the  eastern  end  of  Thames  Street, 
by  Tower  wharf.  Billingsgate,  as  a  synonym  for  bad 
language,  has  been  strewn  up  and  down  English 
literature  for  centuries  past.  Morose,  in  Ben  Jonson's 
Silent  Woman,  recalling  the  most  unpleasant  places 


BY  THE  THAMES  171 

of  his  acquaintance,  swears  that  if  only  it  would 
enable  him  to  get  rid  of  his  wife  he  would  do  penance 
"  in  a  belfry,  at  Westminster  Hall,  the  Tower  wharf — 
what  place  is  there  else  ? — London  Bridge,  Paris 
Garden,  Billingsgate,  when  the  noises  are  at  their 
height,  and  loudest."  Olivia,  in  Wycherley's  Plain 
Dealer,  speaking  of  the  surly,  honest,  Manly,  a  sea- 
captain,  cries  scornfully,  "  Foh  !  I  hate  a  lover  that 
smells  like  Thames  Street."  You  see  Major  Dobbin 
at  his  father's  warehouse  down  Thames  Street,  in 
Vanity  Fair  ;  James  Gann,  of  A  Shabby-Genteel  Story, 
married  and  set  up  housekeeping  in  the  same  street ; 
and  it  was  on  a  Thames  Street  wharf  that  Walter 
Gay  first  met  Florence  Dombey. 

When  Mr.  Simon  Tappertit,  of  Barnaby  Rudgc,  called 
on  Mr.  Chester,  at  his  chambers  in  the  Temple,  he 
was  carrying  a  great  lock  which  he  was  on  his 
way  to  fit  "  on  a  ware'us  door  in  Thames  Street." 
Mrs.  Nickleby  lived  in  Thames  Street,  and  Newman 
Noggs  drove  her  and  Kate  Nickleby  there  in  a  coach 
when  they  first  went  to  take  possession  of  the  house  — 

"  a  large  old  dingy  house  in  Thames  Street,  the  door  and 
windows  of  which  were  so  bespattered  with  mud  that  it  would 
appear  to  have  been  uninhabited  for  years.  .  .  .  Old  and 
gloomy  and  black  in  truth  it  was,  and  sullen  and  dark  were 
the  rooms  once  so  bustling  with  life  and  enterprise.  There 
was  a  wharf  behind,  opening  on  the  Thames.  An  empty 
dog-kennel,  some  bones  of  animals,  fragments  of  iron  hoops, 
and  staves  of  old  casks  lay  strewn  about  but  no  life  was  stirring 
there.     It  was  a  picture  of  cold,  silent  decay." 

In  Thames  Street,  too,  lived  Mrs.  Clcnnam,  with 
Mr.  Flint wich  and  his  wife  Affcry,  in  "  an  old  brick 
house,  so  dingy  us  to  be  almost  black."     Little  Dorrit 


172  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

used  to  come  along  Thames  Street  to  it,  and  Arthur 
Clennam,  and  the  rascally  Rigaud  ;  but  it  is  no  use 
looking  for  it  ;  it  was  a  "  debilitated  old  house," 
standing  propped  on  huge  crutches,  and  I  need  not 
remind  you  that  it  collapsed  into  ruins  before  the 
story  ended.  Althea,  of  The  Bell  of  St.  Paul's,  who 
had  a  passion  for  London's  relics  of  the  past  and 
pandered  to  Besant's  weakness  for  making  certain  of 
his  novels  very  guide-booky,  came  over  from  Bankside 
one  Saturday  afternoon  with  Laurence  Waller,  bent 
on  showing  him  round,  "  all  through  one  afternoon, 
from  west  to  east,  from  Puddle  Dock  to  Tower  Hill, 
from  one  end  to  the  other  of  Thames  Street. 

"  It  was  an  ambitious  programme,  because  the  history  of 
London  might  almost  be  written  in  Thames  Street  alone.  .  .  . 
One  would  rather  walk  down  Thames  Street  than  the  High 
of  Oxford,  or  the  Cannebiere  of  Marseilles,  or  the  Rue  St.  Honore. 
The  modern  warehouses  are  not  in  the  least  picturesque,  yet 
the  names  which  remain  carry  the  memory  back  ;  the  suc- 
cession of  churches,  though  broken  here  and  there  by  the  havoc 
of  modern  barbarians,  marks  the  piety  of  London  merchants  ; 
the  narrow  courts  still  lead  to  the  old  stairs,  and  the  two  ancient 
ports  of  Queenhithe  and  Billingsgate  can  still  be  seen,   .   .   . 

"  '  You  are  going  to  teach  me  more  history/  said  Laurence. 
'  Shall  we  become  ghosts  once  more  ?  ' 

"  '  If  you  like,'  she  replied.  '  But  there  is  a  great  deal  more 
history  here  than  I  can  teach  you  in  a  single  afternoon.     Come.' 

"  Then  she  began  to  talk.  London  began  in  Thames  Street, 
where  two  little  hillocks  with  a  brook  between  rose  above  the 
river,  on  either  side  a  swamp.  When  the  hillocks  were  quite 
built  upon  and  still  there  was  not  room  enough  for  the  trade 
which  continued  to  grow,  they  built  a  river  wall  and  more  houses 
behind  it ;  and  then  they  constructed  their  two  ports,  and  as 
they  grew  richer  they  began  to  build  stately  houses  upon  the 
river  wall :  at  one  end  Baynard's  Castle  "  (where  Shakespeare 


BY  THE  THAMES  173 

puts  one  of  the  scenes  of  Richard  111),  "  and  at  the  other  the 
Tower :  in  the  midst  Cold  Harbour  "  (Middleton  has  a  scene 
of  A  Trick  to  Catch  the  Old  One  there)  "  and  the  King's  Steelyard. 
Here  lived  the  Hanse  merchants  :  here  were  the  Halls  of  the 
City  Companies  :  in  the  streets  leading  up  the  hill  at  the  back 
stood  many  a  noble  mansion  in  its  courtyard,  full  of  precious 
carvings,  rich  tapestry,  and  caskets  from  foreign  parts  :  along 
the  streets  was  a  succession  of  noble  churches,  each  with  its 
monuments  and  tombs,  its  vaults  and  its  churchyards  filled 
with  the  bones  of  dead  citizens." 

She  showed  Laurence  the  port  of  Oueenhithe, 
"  which  still  preserves  its  ancient  form  though  the 
buildings  round  it  are  modern  ;  "  and  "  when  they 
were  as  yet  no  more  than  half  way  down  the  street  .  .  . 
Althea  stopped  at  the  corner  of  a  street  leading  north. 
A  little  way  up  the  street  was  a  church  Tower  set  a 
little  way  back,  and,  projecting  from  its  face,  a  great 
clock  reaching  halfway  across  the  street,  with  a  curious 
little  figure  upon  it."  This  street  must  have  been 
Garlick  Hill,  and  the  church  St.  James  Garlickhithe, 
for  it  answers  the  description  accurately,  and  the 
figure  standing  on  its  clock  is  that  of  the  Apostle. 
Althea's  Aunt  Cornelia  was  pew-opener  and  caretaker 
at  that  church  ;  they  went  in  and  interrupted  a 
quarrel  Aunt  Cornelia  was  having  with  her  assistant, 
and  spent  so  much  time  in  going  over  the  building 
with  them  and  seeing  its  curiosities,  that  they  came 
out  disinclined  to  walk  any  further  that  day  in  Thames 
Street. 

Near  by  is  Paul's  Wharf,  and  against  Paul's  Wharf 
the  hero  of  The  Fortunes  of  Nigel  lodged  with  John 
Christie,  the  ship-chandler,  at  the  end  of  a  narrow  lane 
in  a  house  that  looked  out  upon  the  river.     But  after 


174  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

all,  if  I  am  to  confess  the  truth,  the  chief  charm  of 
Thames  Street  centres,  not  in  any  of  these  imaginary 
people,  but  in  two  men  who  once  walked  it  in  the  flesh. 
Chaucer,  whose  pen  "  moved  over  bills  of  lading  " 
on  one  of  the  busy  wharves  hereabouts,  is  said  to 
have  been  bom  in  Thames  Street,  by  Dowgate  Hill, 
and  in  or  near  Dowgate  Robert  Greene,  from  whom 
Shakespeare  took  some  of  his  plots,  spent  his  latter 
days  and  died,  and  few  stories  in  the  history  of  English 
literature  are  more  tragically  pathetic  than  that  of 
Greene's  death.  He  lay  miserably  penniless,  ill  and 
dying  at  the  house  of  a  poor  shoemaker  there  ;  he 
gave  his  host  some  sort  of  promissory  note  for  ten 
pounds  that  he  owed  him  and  wrote  under  it  an  appeal 
to  the  wife  he  had  forsaken  :  "  Doll,  I  charge  thee  by 
the  love  of  our  youth  and  my  soul's  rest,  that  thou 
wilt  see  this  man  paide  ;  for  if  hee  and  his  wife  had 
not  succoured  me,  I  had  died  in  the  streetes."  It 
was  false  sentiment,  I  know,  yet  there  is  something 
oddly  touching  in  the  record  that  his  kindly  hostess 
"  crowned  his  dead  body  with  a  garland  of  bays," 
even  though  it  is  said  that  he  had  asked  her  to  pay 
this  honour  to  his  remains. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

SOUTH    OF   THE   THAMES 

IT  would  be  easy  to  say  hard  things  about  South 
London  :  about  the  slums  and  squalor  of  South- 
wark,  Bermondsey  and  Lambeth  ;  the  drab  monotony 
of  the  streets  of  Battersca  and  Kennington  ;  the  smug 
respectability  and  petty  suburban  spirit  that  preside 
over  Brixton  and  Clapham  ;  the  arcadian  affectations 
of  Tooting  and  Streatham.  All  this  and  more  to  the 
same  purpose  has  been  said  often  enough,  but  it  is 
not  all  the  truth,  nor  even  all  true.  Snobs  gravitate 
towards  the  snob  ;  unto  the  dull  all  things  are  duU, 
except  their  own  doings,  every  place  dull  that  does 
not  live  the  little  life  that  pleases  them  ;  and  the 
suburban-minded  find  or  make  a  suburb  wherever 
they  go.  Each  of  us.  Atlas-like,  carries  his  own 
world  about  with  him,  and  to  the  man  who  carries  a 
world  that  is  large  enough,  and  full  enough,  no  suburb 
is  ever  suburban,  the  dullest  place  is  alive  with  interest, 
and  snobbery  either  does  not  exist,  or  exists  simply 
for  his  private  amusement.  Good  things  come  out 
of  Nazareth,  and  there  are  plenty  of  good  things  in 
it,  if  you  have  eyes  to  see  them  ;  (otherwise  Swinburne 
could  not  have  lived  most  of  his  days  at  Putney,  and 
Blake  could  not  have  strolled  on  Peckham  Rye  and 
seen  angels  in  the  trees  there. 

Go  over  any  one  of  the  Bridges,  and  you  cannot 

175 


176  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

set  foot  in  the  unloveliest  district  on  the  southern 
side  of  the  Thames  without  straightway  stepping  into 
glamorous  reahns  of  romance  ;  in  fact,  romance  will 
come  out  from  it  to  meet  you  before  you  are  half  over 
the  Bridge. 

Nancy  Lord  and  Laurence  Crewe,  of  Gissing's  In 
the  Year  of  Jubilee,  met  at  the  City  end  of  London 
Bridge  and,  before  they  went  on  to  the  Monument, 
lingered  leaning  over  the  parapet,  among  the  crowd 
that  is  nearly  always  leaning  over  it,  looking  down  on 
the  shipping,  the  vessels  loading  or  unloading  at  the 
wharves,  the  pleasure  steamers  leaving  or  coming  in 
at  the  Old  Swan  Pier.  Once  upon  a  time,  you  may 
learn  from  Our  Mutual  Friend,  "  a  boat  of  dirty  and 
disreputable  appearance,  with  two  figures  in  it,  floated 
on  the  Thames,  between  Southwark  Bridge,  which  is 
of  iron,  and  London  Bridge,  which  is  of  stone,  as  an 
autumn  evening  was  closing  in.  The  figures  in  this 
boat  were  those  of  a  strong  man  with  ragged  grizzled 
hair  and  a  sunbrowned  face,  and  a  dark  girl  of 
nineteen  or  twenty,  sufficiently  like  him  to  be  recog- 
nisable as  his  daughter."  These  were  Lizzie  Hexam 
and  her  father.  Rogue  Riderhood  ;  she  was  rowing, 
and  he  watching  the  water  on  the  chance  of  picking  up 
a  drowned  body  and  securing  a  reward  for  it.  Up 
and  down  the  Thames  between  this  and  Rotherithe 
and  Limehouse,  past  wharves  and  warehouses,  moored 
ships  and  barges,  and  the  crazy,  toppling  old  inns  and 
huts  and  frowsy  residences  that  line  the  two  muddy 
banks  of  the  river,  was  his  regular  nightly  beat  on 
that  gruesome  search.  Little  Dorrit,  when  she  lodged 
with  her  father  in  the  Marshalsea,  used  to  come  over 
London  Bridge  to  her  sewing-work  at  Mrs.  Clennam's 


hhto 


LiNCOLNS  Inn  Q/T^vi^y 

"  IVt  fittsscd  into  siniihn  quietude  under  an  old  g-atcU'ay  "  so  Esther,  in  "  lUcak 
l/ause,"  dtscrihcs  her  arri-.ml  here  in  n  eah  along  Chancery  Lane. 

Chafter  JO 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  177 

in  Thames  Street,  and  went  home  that  way  warily, 
for  fear  anyone  should  follow  her  and  discover  where 
she  lived  :  "  This  was  the  life  and  this  the  history  of 
Little  Dorrit  ;  turning  at  the  end  of  London  Bridge, 
recrossing  it,  going  back  again,  passing  on  to  St. 
George's  Church,  turning  back  suddenly  once  more, 
and  flitting  in  at  the  open  gate  and  little  courtyard 
of  the  Marshalsea." 

David  Copperfield  passed,  with  Mr.  Mell,  over 
London  Bridge  on  his  way  to  Mr.  Creakle's  school. 
In  one  of  the  Sketches  by  Boz  Dickens  describes  how 
the  steamers  start  from  the  Old  Swan  Pier  on  the  run 
to  Gravesend  and  Margate  ;  and  in  another  he  tells 
you  how  the  Tuggs's,  who  kept  a  grocer's  shop,  "  in 
a  narrow  street  on  the  Surrey  side  of  the  water  within 
three  minutes  walk  of  the  old  London  Bridge,"  made 
the  voyage  to  Ramsgate  to  celebrate  their  coming 
into  an  inheritance  of  twenty  thousand  pounds. 
London  Bridge  is  the  scene,  too,  of  a  memorable 
chapter  of  Oliver  Twist.  Nancy  came  here  one  mid- 
night, shadowed  by  the  disguised  Noah  Claypole, 
whom  Fagin  had  set  to  spy  upon  her,  to  meet  Mr. 
Browlow  and  Rose  Maylic  and  disclose  to  them,  in 
the  interests  of  OHvcr,  some  of  the  secrets  of  lier 
associates  : 

"  The  churcli  clocks  chimed  three  quarters  past  eleven,  as 
two  figures  emerged  on  London  ]iridge.  One,  which  advanced 
with  a  swift  and  rapid  step,  was  that  of  a  woman,  who  looked 
eagerly  about  her  as  though  in  cjuest  of  some  expected  object  ; 
the  other  figure  was  that  of  a  man,  who  slunk  along  in  the 
deepest  shadow  he  could  find,  and  at  some  distance,  accommo- 
dating his  pace  to  hers.  .  .  .  Thus  they  crossed  the  Bridge  from 
Middlesex  to  the  Surrey  shore  :    when  the  woman,  apparently 


178  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

disappointed  in  her  anxious  scrutiny  of  the  foot-passengers, 
turned  back.  The  movement  was  sudden  ;  but  he  who  watched 
her  was  not  thrown  off  his  guard  by  it ;  for  shrinking  into  one 
of  the  recesses  which  surmount  the  piers  of  the  Bridge,  and 
leaning  over  the  parapet  the  better  to  conceal  his  figure,  he 
suffered  her  to  pass  by  on  the  opposite  pavement.  ...  It 
was  a  very  dark  night.  .  .  .  A  mist  hung  over  the  river,  deepen- 
ing the  red  glare  of  the  fires  that  burnt  upon  the  small  craft 
moored  off  the  different  wharves,  and  rendering  darker  and 
more  indistinct  the  mirkier  buildings  on  the  banks.  The  old 
smoke-stained  storehouses  on  either  side  rose  heavy  and  dull 
from  the  dense  mass  of  roofs  and  gables  and  frowned  sternly 
upon  water  too  black  to  reflect  even  their  lumbering  shapes. 
The  tower  of  old  St.  Saviour's  Church,  and  the  spire  of  Saint 
Magnus,  so  long  the  giant  warders  of  the  ancient  bridge,  were 
visible  in  the  gloom  ;  but  the  forest  of  shipping  below  bridge, 
and  the  thickly  scattered  spires  of  churches  above,  were  nearly 
all  hidden  in  the  night.  The  girl  had  taken  a  few  restless  turns 
to  and  fro — closely  watched  meanwhile  by  her  hidden  observer 
—when  the  heavy  bell  of  St.  Paul's  tolled  for  the  death  of 
another  day.  Midnight  had  come  upon  the  crowded  city.  .  .  . 
The  hour  had  not  struck  two  minutes  when  a  young  lady, 
accompanied  by  a  grey-haired  gentleman,  alighted  from  a 
hackney  carriage  within  a  short  distance  of  the  bridge  and, 
having  dismissed  the  vehicle,  walked  straight  towards  it. 
They  had  scarcely  set  foot  upon  its  pavement  when  the  girl 
started,  and  immediately  made  towards  them.  They  walked 
onward,  looking  about  them  with  the  air  of  persons  who  enter- 
tained some  very  slight  expectation  which  had  little  chance 
of  being  realised,  when  they  were  suddenly  joined  by  this 
new  associate.  They  halted  with  an  exclamation  of  surprise, 
but  suppressed  it  immediately  ;  for  a  man  in  the  garments  of 
a  countryman  came  close  up — brushed  against  them,  indeed — 
at  that  precise  moment. 

"  '  Not  here,'  said  Nancy  hurriedly,  '  I'm  afraid  to  speak  to 
you  here.  Come  away — out  of  the  public  road — down  the 
steps  yonder  ! ' 

"  A^  she  uttered  these  words  and  indicated,  with  her  hand. 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  179 

the  direction  in  which  she  wished  them  to  proceed,  the  country- 
man looked  round,  and  roughly  asking  what  they  took  up  the 
whole  pavement  for,  passed  on.  The  steps  to  which  the  girl 
had  pointed  were  those  which,  on  the  Surrey  bank  and  on 
the  same  side  of  the  bridge  as  Saint  Saviour's  Church,  form 
a  landing-stairs  from  the  river.  To  this  spot  the  man  bearing 
the  appearance  of  a  countryman  hastened  unobserved  ;  and 
after  a  moment's  survey  of  the  place  he  began  to  descend. 
These  stairs  are  a  part  of  the  bridge  ;  they  consist  of  three 
flights.  Just  below  the  end  of  the  second,  going  down,  the 
stone  wall  on  the  left  terminates  in  an  ornamental  pilaster 
facing  towards  the  Thames.  At  this  point  the  lower  steps 
widen  :  so  that  a  person  turning  that  angle  of  the  wall  is 
necessarily  unseen  by  any  others  on  the  stairs  who  chance  to 
be  above  him,  if  only  a  step.  The  countryman  looked  hastily 
round  when  he  reached  this  point ;  and  as  there  seemed  no 
better  place  of  concealment  and,  the  tide  being  out,  there  was 
plenty  of  room,  he  slipped  aside,  with  his  back  to  the  pilaster, 
and  there  waited." 

Nancy,  Mr.  Brownlow  and  Rose  Maylie  presently 
came  down  the  steps,  and  paused  here,  beyond  hear- 
ing from  above,  whilst  Nancy  made  her  disclosures  ; 
Noah  Claypole,  crouched  behind  the  pilaster,  over- 
heard, and  when  they  had  gone.  Rose  and  Mr. 
Brownlow  first,  and  Nancy  after  an  interval,  he 
hurried  back  to  Fagin  with  his  report.  Sikes  being 
told,  believed  she  had  betrayed  the  whole  gang,  and 
in  the  madness  of  his  rage,  murdered  Nancy  and  fled. 

If  you  cross  the  road  to  the  eastern  side  of  the 
bridge  and  look  down  on  J^otherithc,  over  the 
parapet,  you  may  see  Jacob's  Island  with  the  grimy, 
ancient  house  upon  it  to  which  Sikcs  came  when  the 
police  were  hot  on  his  track,  and  from  the  roof  of 
which,  while  the  mob  was  helping  the  officers  to 
batter  in  the  door  and  capture  him,  Sikes,  planning 


180  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

desperately  to  escape  by  lowering  himself  behind  the 
house  into  the  deserted  ditch  which  the  incoming 
tide  was  filling,  slipped  and  fell,  and,  the  noose  in  the 
rope  catching  round  his  neck,  was  hanged.  On  a 
certain  dark  night,  Barnaby  Rudge's  villainous  father 
"  crossed  London  Bridge  and  passed  into  Southwark," 
where,  in  a  bye-street  he  came  upon  the  unhappy 
wife  who  lived  in  fear  of  his  finding  her,  furtively 
tracked  her  to  her  home  ;  and  having  terrified  her 
with  threats  and  got  food  and  money  from  her,  came 
gliding  back  across  the  bridge  and  "  plunged  into  the 
backways,  lanes  and  courts  between  Cornhill  and 
Smithfield." 

Immediately  you  are  well  over  the  Bridge,  you  have 
on  the  left  London  Bridge  Station,  to  which  Pendennis, 
Warrington  and  Fred  Bayham  went  one  morning  "  at 
an  early  hour  proposing  to  breathe  the  fresh  air  of 
Greenwich  Park  before  dinner.  And  at  London 
Bridge,  by  the  most  singular  coincidence.  Lady  Kew's 
carriage  drove  up  to  the  Brighton  entrance,  and  Miss 
Ethel  and  her  maid  stepped  out  of  the  brougham." 
On  the  right,  facing  the  railway-station  approach,  is 
St.  Saviour's,  Southwark,  lately  renamed,  and  now 
known  as  Southwark  Cathedral.  Shakespeare's 
brother,  Edmund,  Fletcher,  the  dramatist,  and 
Massinger  are  buried  in  it,  but  their  graves  are  not 
marked,  and  the  most  interesting  of  its  many  ancient 
tombs  is  that  of  Chaucer's  contemporary,  Gower,  with 
a  painted  effigy  of  the  poet  lying  upon  it,  his  head 
pillowed  on  his  books.  Behind  Southwark  Cathedral 
is  a  wide,  long  tract  known  as  Bankside  ;  it  stretches 
as  far  as  to  Southwark  Bridge,  and  beyond  that 
nearly  to  Westminster.     On  the  part  between  London 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  181 

and  Southwark  Bridges  stood  the  Globe  Theatre, 
where  Shakespeare's  and  Ben  Jonson's  plays  were 
produced  and  Shakespeare  was  actor-manager.  The 
site  of  it  is  occupied  now  by  Barclay  and  Perkins's 
Brewery,  and  Barclay  and  Perkins  were  successors  to 
that  Mr.  Thrale  who  was  the  friend  of  Dr.  Johnson. 

But  we  keep  straight  on  down  the  Borough  High 
Street,  and  in  due  course  come  to  a  remnant  of  Lant 
Street,  where  Dickens  lodged  when  he  was  a  boy, 
whilst  his  father  was  imprisoned  in  the  Marshalsea 
and  where,  if  you  have  read  Pickwick,  you  know 
that  Bob  Sawyer,  that  dashing  medical  student,  had 
apartments  : 

"  There  is  a  repose  about  Lant  Street,  in  the  Borough,  whith 
sheds  a  gentle  melancholy  upon  the  soul.  There  are  always 
a  good  many  houses  to  let  in  the  street ;  it  is  a  bye-street,  too, 
and  its  dulness  is  soothing.  ...  If  a  man  wished  to  abstract 
himself  from  the  world  ;  to  remove  himself  from  within  the 
reach  of  temptation  ;  to  place  himself  beyond  the  possibility 
of  any  inducement  to  look  out  of  the  window,  we  should  recom- 
mend him  by  all  means  to  go  to  Lant  Street.  .  .  .  The  chief 
features  in  the  still  life  of  the  street  are  green  shutters,  lodging- 
bills,  brass  door-plates  and  bell-handles.  .  .  .  The  population 
is  migratory,  usually  disappearing  on  the  verge  of  quarter-day, 
and  generally  by  night." 

The  house  where  Dickens  lodged,  and  where  Bob 
Sawyer  was  living  when  he  gave  his  famous  party,  is 
gone  ;  the  street  is  "  near  to  Guy's,"  said  Mr.  Sawyer, 
"  and  handy  for  me,  you  know."  And  close  by,  in 
St.  Thomas  Street,  is  Guy's,  which  Keats  walked 
when  he  was  studying  surgery. 

The  most  famous  of  the  many  Inns  in  the  I3oro' 
High  Street  is  the  Tabard,  which  has  inherited  the 
site  of  that  Inn  from  which  the  pilgrims  used  to  set 


182  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

out  on  their  journeys  to  Canterbury,  as  they  set  out 
from  it  one  April  day  in  the  fourteenth  century  when 
Chaucer  was  one  of  them  : 

Byfel  that,  in  that  season  on  a  day, 
In  Southwerk  at  the  Tabard  as  I  lay, 
Redy  to  wenden  on  my  pilgrimage 
To  Canterbury  with  ful  devout  corage, 
At  night  was  come  into  that  hostelrie 
Wei  nyne  and  twenty  in  a  companye, 
Of  sondry  folk,  by  aventure  i-falle 
In  felawschipe,  and  pilgryms  were  they  alle, 
That  toward  Canturbury  wolden  ryde. 

He  introduces  us  to  all  the  company,  and  they  have 
been  riding  to  Canterbury  ever  since  ;  and  as  surely 
as  Chaucer  was  the  father  of  English  poetry,  that 
immortal  Inn  was  its  birthplace. 

Shakespeare  has  a  scene  of  Henry  VI  in  Southwark, 
where  Cade  and  his  rebels  parley  with  Buckingham 
and  the  King's  forces  ;  and  at  another  Inn,  the  White 
Hart,  there,  whose  yard  still  remains.  Jack  Cade 
took  up  his  head-quarters.  The  Inn  is  replaced  by 
an  ugly  building  which  appropriately  houses  "  The 
Sam  Wcllcr  Social  Club  "  for  it  was  in  the  yard  of 
the  White  Hart  that  Mr.  Pickwick  first  encountered 
Sam  Weller  : 

"  There  are  in  London  several  old  inns,  once  the  headquarters 
of  celebrated  coaches  in  the  days  when  coaches  performed  their 
journeys  in  a  graver  and  more  solemn  manner  than  they  do 
in  these  times  ;  but  which  have  degenerated  into  little  more 
than  the  abiding  and  booking  places  of  country  wagons.  .  .  . 
In  the  Borough  especially,  there  still  remain  some  half  dozen 
old  inns  which  have  preserved  their  external  features  un- 
changed. ...  It  was  in  the  yard  of  one  of  these  inns — of  no 
less  celebrated  a  one  than  the  White  Hart — that  a  man  wa? 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  183 

busily  employed  in  brushing  the  dirt  off  a  pair  of  boots.  .  .  . 
He  was  habited  in  a  coarse-striped  waistcoat  with  black  calico 
sleeves  and  blue  glass  buttons  ;  drab  breeches  and  leggings. 
A  bright  red  handkerchief  was  wound  in  a  very  loose  and  un- 
studied style  round  his  neck,  and  an  old  white  hat  was  care- 
lessly thrown  on  one  side  of  his  head.  There  were  two  rows  of 
boots  before  him,  one  cleaned  and  the  other  dirty,  and  at  every 
addition  he  made  to  the  clean  row  he  paused  from  his  work, 
and  contemplated  its  results  with  evident  satisfaction." 

This  was  Sam  Weller,  and  thus  Mr.  Pickwick, 
Mr.  Wardle  and  Mr.  Perker  found  him.  They  arrived 
in  pursuit  of  Mr.  Jingle  who  had  eloped  with  Rachel 
Wardle,  and  the  runaways  were  staying  at  the  White 
Hart,  Mr.  Jingle  being,  at  that  moment,  on  his  way 
back  there  from  Doctor's  Commons  with  a  special 
licence  in  his  pocket.  If  you  step  aside  up  George 
Yard,  which  is  next  to  White  Hart  Yard,  you  may 
see  the  Old  George  Inn  which  with  its  low  ceilings, 
ancient  rafters  and  old  wooden  galleries  outside  closely 
resembles  what  the  White  Hart  used  to  be  and  gives 
you  an  idea  of  the  old  Inn  yards  in  which  the  strolling 
players  of  Shakespeare's  time  used  to  set  up  their 
stages. 

Over  the  road,  iiom  the  White  Hart,  stood  the 
King's  Bench  Prison,  to  which  the  officers  brought 
Mr.  Micawber  from  Windsor  Terrace  ;  but  a  more 
famous  debtor's  prison,  the  Marshalsca,  stood  farther 
down  the  High  Street,  on  the  left,  its  side  windows 
overlooking  the  churchyard  of  St.  George's,  which 
thrusts  itself  out  from  the  level  of  the  houses  here 
and  bars  half  the  roadway.  Dickens's  father  was 
imprisoned  in  the  Marshalsca,  and  Dickens  as  a  boy 
came  often  down  fn^m  his  lodging  in  Lant  Street  and 


184  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

was  in  and  out  visiting  him.  But  the  Marshalsea  is 
famous  chiefly  because  its  shadow  overhes  all  the 
story  of  Little  Dorrit.  The  place  might  almost  be 
rebuilt  from  Dickens's  descriptions,  but  there  is  no 
use  in  repeating  them  for  it  is  all  gone — or  nearly  all. 
Several  years  ago  I  went  up  Angel  Court,  which  opens 
from  the  Borough  High  Street  a  little  before  you 
get  to  the  church,  and  saw  the  last  fragments  that 
Dickens  tells  you,  in  a  preface  dated  May  1857,  were 
all  that  remained  of  the  Marshalsea  in  his  latter  days  : 

"  Some  of  my  readers  may  have  an  interest  in  being  informed 
whether  or  no  any  portions  of  the  Marshalsea  Prison  are  yet 
standing.  I  did  not  know  myself  until  the  sixth  of  this  present 
month,  when  I  went  to  look.  I  found  the  outer  front  court- 
yard, often  mentioned  in  this  story,  metamorphosed  into  a 
butter-shop  ;  and  I  then  almost  gave  up  every  brick  of  the 
jail  for  lost.  Wandering,  however,  down  a  certain  adjacent 
'  Angel  Court,  leading  to  Bermondsey,'  I  came  to  Marshalsea 
Place  ;  the  houses  in  which  I  recognised  not  only  as  the  great 
block  of  the  former  prison,  but  as  preserving  the  rooms  that 
arose  in  my  mind's  eye  when  I  became  Little  Dorrit's  biographer. 
The  smallest  boy  I  ever  conversed  with,  carrying  the  largest 
baby  I  ever  saw,  offered  a  supernaturally  intelligent  explanation 
of  the  locality  in  its  old  uses,  and  was  very  nearly  correct.  .  .  . 
I  pointed  to  the  room  where  Little  Dorrit  was  born,  and  where 
her  father  lived  so  long,  and  asked  him  what  was  the  name  of 
the  lodger  who  tenanted  that  apartment  at  present  ?  He  said 
'  Tom  Pythick.'  I  asked  him  who  was  Tom  Pythick  ?  and 
he  said,  '  Joe  Pythick's  uncle.'  A  little  further  on  I  found  the 
older  and  smaller  wall  which  used  to  enclose  the  pent-up  inner 
prison  where  nobody  was  put  except  for  ceremony.  But, 
whosoever  goes  into  Marshalsea  Place,  turning  out  of  Angel 
Court,  leading  to  Bermondsey,  will  find  his  feet  on  the  very 
paving-stones  of  the  extinct  Marshalsea  jail ;  will  see  its  narrow 
yard  to  the  right  and  to  the  left,  very  little  altered  if  at  all, 
except  that  the  walls  were  lowered  when  the  place  got  free  ; 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  185 

will  look  upon  the  rooms  in  which  the  debtors  lived,  and  will 
stand  among  the  crowding  ghosts  of  many  miserable  years." 

Angel  Court  is  still  there  ;  it  no  longer  leads  to 
Bermondsey,  for  it  has  been  cut  short  and  blocked 
in,  but  it  still  keeps  a  few  of  those  sad  old  houses 
that  Dickens  identified. 

If  the  Marshalsea  with  all  its  memories  of  Little 
Dorrit  and  her  family,  and  of  Arthur  Clennam, 
Plomish,  Mr.  Panks,  and  the  rest  of  those  who  visited 
them  there,  is  vanished,  St.  George's  Church  survives 
unaltered  ;  it  is  much  as  it  was  in  the  eighteenth 
century  when  young  William  Halliday  of  Besant's 
Orange  Girl,  cast  off  by  his  family,  was  its  organist  ; 
and  you  must  not  pass  it  without  going  in  and  seeing 
the  vestry.  There  was  a  night,  you  know,  when 
Little  Dorrit  and  Maggy  got  back  to  the  Marshalsea 
too  late  ;  the  gates  were  closed  and  there  was  nothing 
for  it  but  for  them  to  walk  about  the  streets  until 
they  were  opened  again  next  morning  : 

"  They  went  back  again  to  the  gate,  intending  to  wait  there 
now  until  it  should  be  opened  ;  but  the  air  was  so  raw  and  cold 
that  Little  Dorrit,  leading  Maggy  about  in  her  sleep,  kept  in 
motion.  Going  round  by  the  church,  she  saw  lights  there, 
and  the  door  open,  and  went  up  the  steps  and  looked  in. 

"  '  Who's  that  ?  '  cried  a  stout  man,  who  was  putting  on  a 
nightcap  as  if  he  were  going  to  bed  in  a  vault. 

"  '  It's  no  one  particular,  sir,'  said  Little  Dorrit. 

"  '  Stop  ! '  cried  the  man.     '  Let's  have  a  look  at  you  ! ' 

"  This  caused  her  to  turn  back,  in  the  act  of  going  out,  and 
to  present  herself  and  her  charge  before  him. 

"  '  I  thought  so,'  said  he.     '  I  know  you.'' 

"  '  We  have  often  seen  each  other,'  said  Little  Dorrit,  recog- 
nising the  sexton,  or  the  beadle,  or  the  verger,  or  whatever  he 
was,  '  when  I  have  been  at  church  here.' 


186  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  '  More  than  that,  we've  got  your  birth  in  our  Register, 
you  know  ;  you're  one  of  our  curiosities.' 

"  '  Indeed  ?  '  said  Little  Dorrit. 

"  '  To  be  sure.  As  the  child  of  the — by-the-bye,  how  did 
you  get  out  so  early  ?  ' 

"  '  We  were  shut  out  last  night,  and  are  waiting  to  get  in.' 

"  '  You  don't  mean  it  ?  And  there'.s  another  hour  good 
yet  !  Come  into  the  vestry.  You'll  find  a  fire  in  the  vestry 
on  account  of  the  painters.  I'm  waiting  for  the  painters,  or  I 
shouldn't  be  here,  you  may  depend  upon  it.  One  of  our 
curiosities  mustn't  be  cold,  when  we  have  it  in  our  power  to 
warm  her  up  comfortable.     Come  along.' 

"  He  was  a  very  good  old  fellow  in  his  familiar  way  ;  and 
having  stirred  the  vestry  fire,  he  looked  round  the  shelves 
of  registers  for  a  particular  volume.  '  Here  you  are,  you  see,' 
he  said,  taking  it  down  and  turning  the  leaves.  '  Here  you'll 
find  yourself,  as  large  as  life.  Amy,  daughter  of  William  and 
Fanny  Dorrit.  Born,  Marshalsea  Prison,  Parish  of  St.  George, 
And  we  tell  people  that  you  have  lived  there  without  so  much 
as  a  day's  or  a  night's  absence  ever  since.     Is  it  true  ?  ' 

"  '  Quite  true,  till  last  night.' 

"  '  Lord  ! '  But  his  surveying  her  with  an  admiring  gaze 
suggested  something  else  to  him,  to  wit :  '  I  am  sorry  to  see, 
though,  that  you  are  faint  and  tired.  Stay  a  bit.  I'll  get 
some  cushions  out  of  the  church,  and  you  and  your  friend  shall 
lie  down  before  the  fire.  Don't  be  afraid  of  not  going  in  to 
join  your  father  when  the  gate  opens.  Fll  call  you.'  He 
soon  brought  in  the  cushions,  and  strewed  them  on  the  ground. 
'  There  you  are,  you  see.  Again  as  large  as  life.  Oh,  never 
mind  thanking.  I've  daughters  of  my  own.  And  though 
they  weren't  born  in  the  Marshalsea  Prison,  they  might  have 
been,  if  I  had  been,  in  my  ways  of  carrying  on,  of  your  father's 
breed.  Stop  a  bit.  I  must  put  something  under  the  cushion 
for  your  head.  Here's  a  burial  volume.  Just  the  thing  !  We 
have  got  Mrs.  Bangham  in  this  book.  But  what  makes  these 
books  interesting  to  most  people  is — not  who's  in  'em,  but 
who  isn't — who's  coming,  you  know,  and  when.  That's  the 
interesting  question.' 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  187 

"  Commendingly  looking  back  at  the  pillow  he  had  impro- 
vised, he  left  them  to  their  hour's  repose.  Maggy  was  snoring 
already,  and  Little  Dorrit  was  soon  fast  asleep,  with  her  head 
resting  on  that  sealed  book  of  Fate,  untroubled  by  its  mysterious 
blank  leaves." 

Just  past  the  church  is  Horsemonger  Lane,  which 
reminds  you  that  Little  Dorrit  had  a  ridiculously 
impossible  lover  in  Young  John  Chivery  the  son  of 
a  non-resident  turnkey,  and  he  "  assisted  his  mother 
in  the  conduct  of  a  snug  tobacco  business  round 
the  comer  of  Horsemonger  Lane.  .  .  .  The  tobacco 
business  round  the  corner  of  Horsemonger  Lane  was 
carried  on  in  a  rural  establishment  one  story  high, 
which  had  the  benefit  of  the  air  from  the  yards  of 
Horsemonger  Lane  Jail,  and  the  advantage  of  a  retired 
walk  under  the  wall  of  that  pleasant  establishment. 
The  business  was  of  too  modest  a  character  to  support 
a  life-size  Highlander,  but  it  maintained  a  little  one 
on  a  bracket  on  the  doorpost,  who  looked  like  a  fallen 
Cherub  that  had  found  it  necessary  to  take  to  a  kilt." 
It  is  the  same  dingy,  unwholesome,  disreputable 
thoroughfare  as  ever,  though  it  is  now  disguised  as 
Long  Lane  ;  moreover,  you  can  get  to  it  without 
passing  the  church,  because  a  road  has  been  cut  to 
it  through  the  churchyard  ;  and  whenever  Young 
John  lost  hope,  and  when  Little  Dorrit  told  him 
gently  he  must  give  up  hoping  altogether,  he  found 
comfort  in  imagining  himself  dead  and  in  composing 
an  affecting  inscription  to  go  on  his  tombstone  in 
St.  George's  Churchyard,  the  severed  portion  of  which 
is  now  a  garden. 

Dickens  is  all  about  this  neighbourhood.  To  the 
right,  along  Marshalsca  Road,  is  the  Farmhouse,  still 


188  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

a  common  lodging-house,  as  it  was  when  he  went  over 
it  one  day  with  Inspector  Field,  and  the  sketch  he 
gives  of  it  remains  accurate.  "It  is  the  old  Manor 
House  of  these  parts  and  stood  in  the  country  once.  .  .  . 
This  long,  paved  yard  was  a  garden  or  a  paddock  once, 
or  a  court  in  front  of  the  Farm  House.  Perchance, 
with  a  dovecot  in  the  centre,  and  fowls  pecking  about — 
with  fair  elm  trees,  then,  where  discoloured  chimney- 
stacks  and  gables  are  now — noisy,  then,  with  rooks 
which  have  yielded  to  a  different  sort  of  rookery. 
It  is  likelier  than  not,  Inspector  Field  thinks,  as  we 
turn  into  the  common  kitchen,  which  is  in  the  yard 
and  many  paces  from  the  house."  When  I  visited 
the  Farmhouse  it  was  to  see  a  pedlar-poet  who  was 
dossing  there  for  fourpence  a  night  and  has  since 
risen  to  distinction  and  received  a  Civil  List  Pension. 
I  went  alone,  for  it  is  orderly  and  law-abiding  now, 
but  in  Dickens's  time  it  swarmed  with  sinister  and 
dangerous  characters,  and  was  not  to  be  visited  safely 
unless  you  were  accompanied  by  a  police  officer. 

Farther  south  lies  Camberwell  Green,  and  beyond 
that  lived  Wemmick  with  his  father  at  the  small 
house  they  called  the  Castle.  On  an  important  day 
when  Pip  called  on  him,  he  and  Pip  came  out  for  a 
walk  :  "  We  went  towards  Camberwell  Green,  and 
when  we  were  thereabouts,  Wemmick  said  suddenly, 
'  Hallo  !  Here's  a  church  !  '  "  and  added,  as  if  he 
were  animated  by  a  brilliant  idea,  "  Let's  go  in  !  " 
There  by  the  Green  is  the  church,  and  who  will  may 
go  in  it.  Inside,  they  beheld  his  father,  "  the  Aged," 
entering  by  a  side  door  escorting  Miss  Skifftns  ;  and 
producing  and  putting  on  a  pair  of  white  kid  gloves, 
Wemmick   exclaimed,    in    the   same   casual   fashion, 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  189 

"  Hallo  !  Here's  Miss  Skiffins.  Let's  have  a  wedding." 
The  clerk  and  clergyman  appeared,  Wemmick  found 
a  ring  in  his  pocket,  and,  to  Pip's  amazement,  was 
duly  married. 

Nancy  Lord,  of  Gissing's  hi  the  Year  of  Jubilee, 
lived  in  Grove  Lane,  Camberwcll,  "  a  long  acclivity 
which  starts  from  Camberwcll  Green  and,  after  passing 
a  few  mean  shops,  becomes  a  road  of  suburban  dwell- 
ings ;  "  and  from  Camberwcll  Green  Nancy  Lord  and 
her  brother,  Miss  Morgan  and  Samuel  Barmby  took 
a  Westminster  tram  on  their  way  to  Charing  Cross 
to  see  the  illuminations  in  the  London  streets  on  the 
occasion  of  Queen  Victoria's  Jubilee.  Samuel  Barmby, 
by  the  way,  lived  in  Coldharbour  Lane,  which  is  close 
to  Camber\vell  Green,  until  he  became  a  partner  in 
Mr.  Lord's  business,  when  he  removed  to  the  more 
respectable  Dagmar  Street,  not  far  from  Grove  Lane. 

Beyond  Camberwcll  lies  Brixton,  and  west  of  it  is 
Kcnnington :  Osmond  Waymark,  in  Gissing's  Unclasscd, 
was  teacher  in  a  school  at  Brixton,  and  had  lodgings 
in  Walcot  Square,  Kcnnington  ;  and  Kcnnington — 
Kennmgton  Road  particularly — and  Battersea  Park, 
which  is  still  farther  west,  supplied  the  background 
for  many  of  Gissing's  scenes  in  The  Vnclassed,  The 
Town  Traveller,  Thyrza,  and  the  story  of  "  Our  Mr. 
Jupp,"  in  Human  Odds  and  Ends.  Mr.  Gammon,  the 
town  traveller,  lodged  with  Mrs  Bubb  in  Kcnnington 
Road  ;  and  yf)U  may  hjllow  the  course  he  took  that 
day  when  he  walked  "down  Kcnnington  Road  "  at  a 
leisurely  pace,  smiting  his  leg  with  his  doubled  dog- 
whip,  and  looking  about  him  with  his  usual  wide- 
awake, contented  air,"  till  on  reaching  the  end  of 
Upper  Kcnnington  Lane  he  struck  towards  Vaiixhall 


190  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Station,  and  "  a  short  railway  journey  and  another 
pleasant  saunter  brought  him  to  a  china  shop,  off 
Battersea  Park  Road,  over  which  stood  the  name  of 
Clover  ;  "  where  Mrs.  Clover  lived  with  that  mysterious 
husband  of  whom  we  have  already  seen  something 
in  Old  Jewry.  Vauxhall  Station  reminds  you  that 
round  about  here  were  the  gardens  of  that  name 
which,  to  say  nothing  of  the  actual  public,  were  fre- 
quented by  all  manner  of  people  out  of  the  Restora- 
tion Comedies  ;  by  Fanny  Burney's  Evelina  and  her 
friends  ;  Pendennis  went  there  with  Fanny  Bolton 
and  her  mother,  wife  and  daughter  of  the  gatekeeper 
of  Shepherd's  Inn  ;  Dickens  pictures  "  Vauxhall 
Gardens  by  Day,"  in  the  Sketches  by  Boz  ;  but  they 
have  been  cut  up  into  streets,  and  rows  of  plain, 
innocent  suburban  houses  have  been  built  over  them. 
Minnie  Clover,  daughter  of  the  china-shop  people, 
was  employed  at  Doulton's  potteries,  which  you  may 
see  in  the  Vauxhall  neighbourhood.  Polly  Sparkes, 
whom  you  saw  with  Christopher  Parish  at  Liverpool 
Street  Station,  used  to  sell  programmes  at  a  theatre  : 
you  may  stroll  with  her  in  Battersea  Park,  and  then 
go  back  outside  the  bus  with  her  to  Kennington  Road, 
where  she  also  lodged  at  Mrs.  Bubbs's.  Along  Ken- 
nington Road  she  and  Christopher  walked  many 
times  together,  before  that  meeting  at  Liverpool 
Street  Station,  when  she  promised  at  last  to  marry 
him ;  and  in  Kennington  Road,  Lydia  Trent,  of 
Gissing's  Thyrza,  met  Luke  Acroyd,  and  they  walked 
aside  into  the  quieter  Walcot  Square,  whilst  he  told 
her  how  the  scandalmongers  were  saying  that  her 
sister,  Thyrza,  went  too  often  to  see  the  wealthy 
young  Mr.  Egremont  at  the  library  he  was  forming 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  191 

and  intending  to  open  for  the  benefit  of  the  neigh- 
bourhood. 

All  Lambeth  is  thick  with  memories  of  Thyrza. 
Lydia  and  Thyrza  lodged  there,  in  Walnut  Tree  Walk, 
which  turns  out  of  Lambeth  Walk  : 

"  For  the  most  part  it  consists  of  old  dwellings,  which  probably 
were  the  houses  of  people  above  the  working  class  in  days 
when  Lambeth's  squalor  was  confined  within  narrower  limits. 
The  doors  are  framed  with  dark  wood,  and  have  hanging 
porches.  At  the  end  of  the  street  is  a  glimpse  of  trees  growing 
in  Kennington  Road." 

In  one  of  these  houses  lived  Thyrza  and  Lydia  in 
a  top  front  room.  There  is  a  vivid  little  scene  in  which 
Lydia  and  Mary  Bower,  who  had  called  for  her,  come 
from  the  house  on  the  way  to  chapel,  and  at  the 
Kennington  Road  corner  of  Walnut  Tree  Walk  meet 
Acroyd,  and  Lydia  lingers  to  tell  him  that  her  sister 
is  not  coming  out  that  night,  and  tries  to  make  him 
realise  that  Thyrza  has  no  love  for  him.  Gilbert 
Grail  and  his  mother  lodged  in  the  same  Walnut  Tree 
Walk  house,  and  you  have  Gilbert  coming  out  one 
evening  and  going  into  Lambeth  Walk  where  "  the 
market  of  Christmas  Eve  was  flaring  and  clamorous  ; 
the  odours  of  burning  naphtha  and  fried  fish  were 
pungent  on  the  wind  : 

*'  He  walked  a  short  distance  among  the  crowd,  then  found 
the  noise  oppressive  and  turned  into  a  i^yway.  As  he  did  so, 
a  street  organ  began  to  play  in  front  of  a  public-house  close  by. 
Grail  drew  near;  there  were  children  f(jrming  a  dance,  and  he 
stood  to  watch  them. 

"  Do  you  know  that  music  of  obscure  ways,  to  which  children 
dance  ?  Not  if  you  have  only  heard  it  ground  to  your  ears' 
affliction   beneath  your  windows  in   the  scjuare.     To  hear  it 


192  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

aright  you  must  stand  in  the  darkness  of  such  a  by-street  as 
this,  and  for  the  moment  be  at  one  with  those  who  dwell  around, 
in  the  blear-eyed  houses,  in  the  dim  burrows  of  poverty,  in 
the  unmapped  haunts  of  the  semi-human.  Then  you  will 
know  the  significance  of  that  vulgar  clanging  of  melody  ;  a 
pathos  of  which  you  did  not  dream  will  touch  you,  and  therein 
the  secret  of  hidden  London  will  be  half  revealed.  The  life  of 
men  who  toil  without  hope,  yet  with  the  hunger  of  an  unshaped 
desire  ;  of  women  in  whom  the  sweetness  of  their  sex  is  perishing 
under  labour  and  misery  ;  the  laugh,  the  song  of  the  girl  who 
strives  to  enjoy  her  year  or  two  of  youthful  vigor,  knowing  the 
darkness  of  the  years  to  come  ;  the  careless  defiance  of  the 
youth  who  feels  his  blood  and  revolts  against  the  lot  which 
would  tame  it ;  all  that  is  purely  human  in  these  darkened 
multitudes  speaks  to  you  as  you  listen.  It  is  the  half-conscious 
striving  of  a  nature  which  knows  not  what  it  would  attain, 
which  deforms  a  true  thought  by  gross  expression,  which 
clutches  at  the  beautiful  and  soils  it  with  foul  hands." 

It  was  not  Gilbert  Grail  who  stood  near  Lambeth 
Walk  and  listened  to  that  music  and  thought  thus  of 
it,  but  Gissing  himself,  and  Lambeth  lays  a  spell 
upon  you  because  wherever  his  characters  go  he  also 
has  been,  and  you  are  conscious  of  his  presence. 
Gilbert  went  on  and  passed  by  Lambeth  Church,  whose 
bells  "  were  ringing  a  harsh  peal  of  four  notes,  un- 
changingly repeated,"  and  on  to  Lambeth  Bridge, 
and  pausing  in  the  middle  of  it,  "  leaned  on  the 
parapet  and  looked  northwards,"  at  Westminster 
Bridge,  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  Westminster 
Abbey,  at  the  Archbishop's  Palace,  at  St.  Thomas's 
Hospital,  and  the  string  of  barges  moored  in  front  of 
the  Embankment. 

Luke  Acroyd  used  to  haunt  a  second-hand  bookshop 
in  Westminster  Bridge  Road,  near  the  Bridge,  and  the 
shop  is  still  there.      He  and  Grail  spoke  of  it  one  night 


\^i^. 


"lll?ij-yr<ftni,s- 


"^l^Uij^^'-'r"' 


i/',iL<.  "■<■  ■      ,   ,,   ,, 

—T  -  'W£J»i';:;..vr 


cred'-AJcock. . 


' '  /«  l.aiiih  HuiUing  that  Jaccs  you  as  vou  round  tlu-  corner  of  the  Churrh, 
Pindi-nnis  and  Warrington  htui  chambers  on  the  third  floor." 

Chnftter  n> 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  193 

as  they  walked  together  past  the  Archbishop's  Palace  ; 
then,  "  from  the  foot  of  Lambeth  Bridge,  turned  into 
a  district  of  small  houses  and  multifarious  workshops. 
Presently  they  entered  Paradise  Street,"  which  was 
where  Acroyd  lived  : 

"  The  name  is  less  descriptive  than  it  might  be.  Poor 
dwellings,  mean  and  cheerless,  are  intersperced  with  factories 
and  one  or  two  small  shops  ;  a  public-house  is  prominent,  and 
a  railway  arch  breaks  the  perspective  of  the  thoroughfare 
midway.  The  street  at  that  time — in  the  year  '80 — began  by 
the  side  of  a  graveyard,  no  longer  used,  and  associated  in  the 
minds  of  those  who  dwelt  around  it  with  numberless  burials 
in  a  dire  season  of  cholera.  The  space  has  since  been  converted 
into  a  flower-garden,  open  to  the  children  of  the  neighbourhood, 
and  in  summer  time  the  bright  flower-beds  enhance  the  ignoble 
baldness  of  the  byway." 

Bowers  shop,  too — a  small  general  shop — was  in 
Paradise  Street,  close  by  the  railway  arch,  and  a 
meeting  place  for  many  of  the  people  of  the  story. 
A  resident  in  the  adjacent  Newport  Street  was 
Totty  Nancarrow,  one  of  the  least  respectable  but 
most  sympathetically  drawn  women-characters  in  the 
book.  Before  starting  to  found  his  library,  Mr. 
Egremont,  benevolently  inspired,  opened  a  lecture 
hall  in  a  room  over  a  saddler's  shop  in  High  Street, 
Lambeth.  Later,  after  the  library  troubles  had  com- 
menced, when  Thyrza  was  wildly  in  love  with  Egre- 
mont and  wretched  because  she  had  not  seen  him  for 
some  time,  she  went  out  one  evening  from  Walnut 
Tree  Walk,  and  calling  to  see  Totty  Nancarrow,  in 
Newport  Street,  found  she  was  not  at  home,  so  sat 
in  her  room  waiting  for  her.  By-and-by,  she  heard 
Egremont's  voice  ;  he  had  called  to  interview  another 
lodger,  Mr.  Bunce,  and  as  soon  as  she  heard  the  street 

13 


194  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

door  close  behind  him,  she  ran  down  and  went  in 
pursuit  ;  she  overtook  him,  and  on  Lambeth  Bridge 
they  had  what  was  to  be  their  last  talk  together. 
But  the  homes  and  haunts  of  these  people  in  Thyrza 
are  thick  about  Lambeth  :  in  Paradise  Street,  and 
Ground  Street  ;  along  Westminster  Bridge  Road ; 
in  the  New  Cut,  where  Mr.  Boddy  once  had  a  shop  ; 
and  while  you  are  there  you  may  recollect  that 
M.  Fandango,  of  Christopher  Tadpole,  was  "  a  pro- 
fessor of  dancing  in  the  New  Cut,"  and  Luke,  in 
Massinger's  City  Madam,  complains  that  his  gentlemen 
'prentices  waste  their  time  in  the  evil  haunts  of  the 
neighbouring  Lambeth  Marsh. 

On  the  morning  of  the  3rd  September  1803,  Words- 
worth lingered  on  Westminster  Bridge  (not  the  present 
one,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  but  its  predecessor)  and  wrote 
one  of  the  finest  of  his  sonnets  : 

Earth  has  not  anything  to  show  more  fair  : 
Dull  would  he  be  of  soul  who  could  pass  by 
A  sight  so  touching  in  its  majesty  : 
The  city  now  doth  like  a  garment  wear 
The  beauty  of  the  morning  ;  silent,  bare, 
ShipSj  towers,  domes,  theatres,  and  temples  lie 
Open  unto  the  fields  and  to  the  sky. 
All  bright  and  glittering  in  the  smokeless  air. 
Never  did  sun  more  beautifully  steep 
In  his  first  splendour  valley,  rock  or  hill, 
Ne'er  saw  I,  never  felt,  a  calm  so  deep  ! 
The  river  glideth  at  his  own  sweet  will ; 
Dear  God  !  the  very  houses  seem  asleep, 
And  all  that  mighty  heart  is  lying  still. 

Over  Waterloo  Bridge  passed  Pendennis,  that  day 
he  bent  his  steps  to  Vauxhall  ;  and  I  like  to  remember 
that  "  the  jolly  man  "  in  Albert  Smith's  Christopher 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  195 

Tadpole  told  Mr.  Sprouts  he  had  a  brother-in-law  who 
kept  a  firework  factory  near  Bedlam,  and  whose  father 
was  a  waiter  at  Vaiixhall.  Bedlam,  or  Bethlehem 
Hospital,  is  at  the  end  of  Blackfriars  Road,  and  past 
Bedlam  more  than  once  went  Totty  Nancarrow  when 
she  was  going  to  St.  George's  comparatively  new 
Roman  Catholic  Cathedral,  which  is  near  by  : 

"  She  entered  and  at  the  proper  place  dropped  on  her  knees 
and  crossed  herself.  Then  she  stood  looking  about.  Near  her, 
hanging  against  a  pillar,  was  a  box  with  the  superscription  : 
'  For  the  Souls  in  Purgatory.'  She  always  put  a  penny  into 
this  box,  and  did  so  now.  Then  she  walked  softly  to  an  image 
of  the  Virgin,  at  whose  feet  someone  had  laid  hot-house  flowers. 
A  poor  woman  was  kneeling  there,  a  woman  in  rags  ;  her  head 
was  bent  in  prayer,  her  hands  clasped  against  her  breast.  Totty 
knelt  beside  her,  bent  her  own  head,  and  clasped  her  hands." 

All  about  Bedlam  and  St.  George's  Circus  is  the 
ground  where  the  Gordon  Rioters  gathered,  as  you 
may  learn  from  Barnahy  Rudge,  in  what  was  then 
St.  George's  Fields.  When  David  Copperiield  had 
resolved  to  run  away  from  Murdstone  and  Grinby's, 
he  left  their  premises  in  the  Blackfriars  Road,  one 
evening,  and  "  saw  a  long-legged  young  man  with 
a  very  little  empty  donkey-cart  standing  near  the 
Obelisk  in  the  Blackfriars  Road  " — the  Obelisk  is  at 
St.  George's  Circus — and  he  arranged  for  the  young 
man  to  accompany  him  to  his  lodgings  in  the  Borough 
and  carry  his  box  to  the  coach-office  for  dispatch  to 
Dover.  The  young  man  went  with  him,  as  you  know, 
and  got  the  box  on  to  his  barrow  and  heartlessly  ran 
away  with  it.  While  Dickens  was  himself  living  at 
Lant  Street,  in  the  Borough,  and  working  at  the 
blacking  fact(;ry  by  Hungerford  Stairs,  "  My   usual 


196  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

way  home/'  he  says,  "  was  over  Blackfriars  Bridge, 
and  down  that  turning  in  the  Blackfriars  Road  which 
has  Rowland  Hill's  chapel  on  one  side,  and  the  like- 
ness of  a  golden  dog  licking  a  golden  pot  over  a  shop 
door  on  the  other."  The  chapel  is  gone  :  it  was 
transformed  into  a  boxing  saloon,  last  time  I  passed 
it ;  but  the  golden  dog  still  licking  the  golden  pot 
remains  at  the  other  corner,  so  much  more  enduring 
are  the  things  men  make  with  their  hands  than  are 
the  hands  that  made  them. 

If  there  were  no  such  things  as  time  and  space  to 
consider,  we  would  certainly  go  east  of  all  the  Bridges 
to  Deptford,  where  Christopher  Marlowe  was  killed 
in  his  duel  with  Archer,  the  player,  and  where  he  lies 
buried  in  St.  Nicholas's  churchyard  ;  John  Evelyn 
had  a  sitting  in  that  same  church,  and  round  about  it 
and  round  the  church  of  St.  Paul's  are  the  streets  and 
lanes  and  taverns  and  houses  that  are  familiar  to  any- 
one who  has  read  that  best  of  Sir  Walter  Besant's 
romances.  The  World  Went  Very  Well  Then,  which  he 
founded,  as  he  mentions  in  a  preface,  "  on  the 
Chronicles  of  Deptford,  and  on  a  tombstone  in  the 
Church  of  St.  Nicholas,"  possibly  the  tombstone  to 
the  memory  of  "  Captain  George  Shelvocke,"  who  was 
"  bred  to  sea-service  under  Admiral  Benbow,"  for 
though  the  hero  of  the  tale  is  Jack  Easterbrook,  and 
the  date  of  it  is  something  later  than  Benbow's  time, 
George  Shelvocke  is  one  of  its  characters,  and  the  talk 
of  Shelvocke  about  his  seafaring  adventures  largely 
influences  Jack  to  a  yearning  for  the  life  of  a  sailor. 
But  we  will  keep  within  range  of  the  Bridges,  and  the 
last  of  these  that  we  will  say  any  more  of  here  is 
Southwark  Bridge. 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THMEES  197 

On  Southwark  Bridge  (which  is  being  altered  and 
widened  whilst  I  write)  young  John  Chi  very  walked 
with  Little  Dorrit  and  was  brought  at  length  to  under- 
stand that  she  could  never  love  him  ;  she  sat  on  one 
of  the  seats  after  he  had  left  her,  "  and  not  only  rested 
her  little  hand  upon  the  rough  wall,  but  laid  her  face 
against  it,  too,  as  if  her  head  were  heavy,  and  her 
mind  were  sad."  And  Dickens  came  over  Southwark 
Bridge  that  day  he  had  been  ill  at  the  blacking  factory, 
when  one  of  the  boys  who  worked  with  him,  Bob  Fagin, 
insisted  on  accompanying  him  home.  He  only  slept  in 
Lant  Street  and  took  his  meals  in  the  prison  with  his 
father,  and  was  ashamed  that  this  should  be  known  : 
"  I  was  too  proud  to  let  him  know  about  the  prison,  and 
after  making  several  efforts  to  get  rid  of  him,  to  all  of  which 
Bob  Fagin  in  his  goodness  was  deaf,  shook  hands  with  him 
on  the  steps  of  a  house  near  Southwark  Bridge,  on  the  Surrey 
side,  making  believe  that  I  hved  there.  As  a  finishing  piece 
of  reahty,  in  case  of  his  looking  back,  I  knocked  at  the  door, 
I  recollect,  and  asked,  when  the  woman  opened  it,  if  that  was 
Mr  Robert  Fagin's  house." 

Let  me  remind  you  here  that  when,  a  chapter  or 
two  back,  we  saw  Dr.  Luttrel  of  Besant's  Bell  of  St. 
Paul's,  purchase  for  five  pounds  the  small  boy  Sam, 
of  his  grandmother  in  Sweet  Lilac  Walk,  SpitaHields, 
Sam's  little  sister,  Sal,  pursued  the  Doctor's  cab  to  see 
where  the  boy  was  taken  :  overtook  it,  hung  on 
behind  and  was  carried  with  it  through  the  City,  up 
Queen  Street,  and  across  Southwark  Bridge  : 

"  On  the  other  side  it  presently  turned  to  the  right  into  a 
region  of  small  streets,  with  mean  houses  standing  among 
great  factories.  In  one  of  these  streets  it  stopped.  Sal  slid 
down  quickly  and  retreated  to  the  shelter  of  a  neighbouring 
lamp-post  where,  half  hidden,  she  could  watch.     When   the 


198        THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

gentleman  had  gone  into  the  house  and  the  cab  had  driven 
away,  the  child  left  her  lamp-post  and  examined  at  her  ease 
both  house  and  street.  The  house  was  easy  to  remember. 
It  was  of  two  stories  with  three  windows  at  the  top,  and  two 
below ;  the  door  between  the  two  was  not  an  ordinary  door, 
but  set  back  in  a  broad  frame  with  two  short  pillars,  not  form- 
ing a  porch  but  fiat  with  the  front  of  the  house.  They  were 
pillars  of  the  Doric  order,  and  the  girl  noted  their  shape  though 
she  knew  not  its  name.  .  .  .  There  was  a  brass  plate  on  the 
door — the  girl  could  not  read,  yet  she  could  remember  the 
appearance  of  the  letters — they  announced  that  Robert  Luttrel, 
M.D.,  lived  and  presumably  practised  the  science  of  heaUng 
in  that  house." 

There  were  "works  "  in  the  street,  and  a  Church, 
and  at  the  end  was  the  river.  The  whole  description 
is  that  of  Emerson  Street,  and  the  house  with  the 
two  short  pillars  is  still  to  be  seen  in  it.  The  street 
opened  on  to  Bankside,  and  all  along  Bankside 
is  reminiscent  of  The  Bell  of  St.  Paul's,  as  well  as 
of  much  older  and  far  more  glorious  literature.  A 
stone's  throw  away  on  the  eastern  side  of  Southwark 
Bridge  glooms  that  brewery  which  has  replaced 
Shakespeare's  theatre,  The  Globe.  From  Bankside, 
on  this  western  side  of  the  Bridge,  goes  Rose  Alley, 
indicating  the  site  of  the  theatre  of  that  name  that 
was  contemporary  with  The  Globe.  A  few  paces  on, 
and  you  note  another  alley  called  Bear  Garden,  and  you 
remember  the  Bear  Garden  on  Bankside  so  often 
spoken  of  in  Elizabethan  writings.  Adjacent  is  Love 
Lane,  in  Shakespeare's  day  a  green,  country  lane, 
now  a  barren,  black  alley  with  walls  of  factories 
towering  up  on  either  hand.  Laurence  Waller,  over 
from  Australia  in  search  of  certain  members  of  his 
family,  took  up  lodgings  with  Mr.  Lucius  Cottle,  on 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  199 

Bankside,  and  you  will  find  an  ample  description  of 
the  place  in  The  Bell  of  St.  Paul's,  and  something  of 
its  history.  The  ancient  wooden  wall  that  Besant 
wrote  of,  the  steps  down  to  the  water,  the  noticeable 
house  occupied  by  Mr.  Cottle  and  his  family,  the  view 
from  Bankside  of  the  city  across  the  river — it  is  all  so 
little  changed  that  I  shall  quote  with  as  little  further 
comment  as  possible  : 

"  It  was  the  evening  of  the  longest  day  of  all  the  year.  .  .  , 
About  a  quarter  past  eight  on  this  day  a  young  man  was  lean- 
ing over  the  wooden  wall  of  the  old  first  and  original — for 
many  years  the  only  Embankment,  called  Bank  Side,  watching 
the  river,  and  the  City  on  the  other  side.  He  stood  at  that 
spot — it  is  on  the  west  of  Southwark  Bridge,  where  there  are 
Stairs.  They  are  not  ancient  Stairs  :  they  are  not  those  at 
which  the  Elizabethan  citizens  landed  to  see  the  matinee  at 
the  Globe,  to  catch  a  fleeting  rapture  at  the  Baiting  of  the 
Bear,  or  to  make  love  among  the  winding  walks  of  Paris 
Gardens.  These  Stairs  are  mere  modern  things  constructed 
in  the  last  century.  But  some  thoughtful  Resident,  ancient 
or  modern,  has  caused  to  be  built  above  them  a  small  pen, 
enclosure  or  fold,  furnished  with  two  wooden  benches,  capable 
of  holding  at  least  four  persons,  and  forming  a  gazebo  or  belve- 
dere from  which  to  view  the  river  and  to  take  the  air.  .  .  . 
Where  the  young  man  stood,  if  he  looked  down  the  river  he 
could  see,  close  at  hand,  Southwark  Bridge,  and  beyond  it  the 
ugly  railway  bridge,  running  into  the  ugly  railway  station  : 
both  together  shut  out  the  view  of  all  that  lay  beyond — London 
Bridge  and  the  Tower  and  the  masts  of  the  ships  in  the  Pool. 
Even  the  most  splendid  sunset  cannot  make  the  Cannon  Street 
Terminus  beautiful.  But  if  he  lf)oked  up  the  river  he  saw,  first, 
Blackfriars  Bridge,  standing  out  with  sharp  clear  fines,  as  if 
cut  out  of  black  cardboard  ;  above  it,  the  dazzling  golden 
light  of  the  western  sky,  and  below  it  the  broad  bosom  of  the 
river  at  the  flood.  .  .  .  Then  he  looked  across  the  river. 
Immediately  opposite  rose  the  pile  of   St.   Paul's,  vast  and 


200  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

majestic — Bank  Side  is  now  the  only  place  where  you  have  a 
really  good  view  of  St.  Paul's.  On  either  side  of  St.  Paul's  rose 
in  lesser  glory  the  spire  of  St.  Bride,  the  Dragon  of  Bow,  the 
pinnacles  of  Aldermarie,  the  Tower  of  St.  Michael's,  and  I  know 
not  how  many  more  of  Wren's  masterpieces.  .  .  .  Below  the 
Churches,  on  the  northern  bank,  are  the  wharves  and  ware- 
houses— Paul's  Wharf,  Baynard's  Castle,  and  the  ancient  Port 
of  Queenhithe.  This  old  harbour  still  retaineth  its  former 
shape,  though  its  buildings,  which  were  once  low,  mean  and 
ugly,  yet  picturesque,  have  long  since  been  transformed  into 
others,  bigger  and  uglier,  yet  not  picturesque." 

The  young  man  gazing  on  these  things  was  Laurence 
Waller ;  and  turning  from  the  river,  he  presently 
surveys  the  houses  facing  it,  and  "  the  old  Embank- 
ment with  its  wooden  walls  :  " 

"  The  place  was  littered  with  coils  of  rusty  chain  and  bits  of 
rusty  machinery.  There  were  cranes  for  the  hoisting  of  things 
in  and  out  of  the  barges  ;  there  were  stairs  to  the  water  ;  there 
were  planks  lying  in  position  for  the  wheelbarrows  between 
the  Embankment  and  the  barges  :  on  the  other  side  of  the 
road  were  gates  leading  to  factories,  works  and  wharves." 

Which  is  all  as  it  is  to-day,  and  there  still  is  that 
house — "  quite  the  cleanest  and  most  respectable 
house  on  Bank  Side  " — wherein  Laurence  Waller  had 
taken  lodgings,  and  as  Laurence  was  looking  at  it, 
in  his  general  view  of  Bankside,  he  saw  Mr.  Lucius 
Cottle  come  out  :  "he  descended  the  two  door-steps 
with  as  much  dignity  as  if  they  had  been  the  staircase 
of  a  Venetian  Palazzo.  .  .  .  Then  he  turned  and 
contemplated  the  house  .  .  .  with  infinite  pride. 
Certainly  the  brightest,  the  most  recently  painted, 
and  the  cleanest  on  the  whole  Embankment.  .  .  . 
There  were  clean  white  curtains  to  all  the  windows  ; 
the  iron  railings  in  the  front  were  clean  ;   the  windows 


SOUTH  OF  THE  THAMES  201 

were  bright  ;  the  brass  knocker  and  the  handle 
were  pohshed  ;  the  door-steps  were  white."  Althea 
was  Cottle's  niece,  and  she  and  one  of  his  daughters 
were  out  in  a  boat  which  brought  them  back  to  the 
stairs  whilst  Cottle  and  Laurence  stood  conversing  ; 
they  all  crossed  and  entered  the  house  together,  and 
indoors  Laurence  was  introduced  to  them  and  the 
rest  of  the  family.  It  was  not  many  days  before 
Laurence  and  Althea  came  to  the  head  of  the  stairs, 
descended  them  and  went  boating  thence  together, 
he  at  the  oars,  she  steering. 

There  was  an  occasion  when  she  conducted  him  all 
along  Bankside,  reconstructing  it,  pointing  out 
ancient  landmarks  and  describing  them  as  they  used 
to  be  when  Shakespeare,  Ben  Jonson,  Marlowe,  and 
their  friends  trod  these  ways  in  the  flesh  : 

Let  us  begin.  See,  now,  this  is  Love  Lane.' 
Laurence  looked  down  a  dark  passage  with  high 
buildings  on  either  side,  so  narrow  that  there  was 
hardly  room  for  two  men  to  pass  each  other."  She 
goes  on  to  explain  that  Love  Lane  ran  along  the  west 
side  of  Paris  Gardens,  and  to  tell  him  something  of 
the  bear-baiting  and  bull-baiting  that  went  on  there. 
Then  at  the  end  of  Bankside,  they  turn  off  into 
Holland  Street,  and  pass  the  decaying,  dirty  old  houses 
in  it,  and  Hopton's  quiet,  rather  forlorn  looking  Alms- 
houses, and  so  round  to  the  left,  past  the  other  end  of 
Love  Lane,  Bear  Garden,  and  other  alleys  that  wind 
up  from  Bankside,  until  they  pass  under  the  arches  of 
Southwark  Bridge.  "  A  little  beyond  the  Bridge 
begins  the  wall  of  the  great  Brewery.  Althea  stopped 
before  this  wall.  '  There,'  she  said,  '  is  the  Globe 
Theatre.'  "     A  tablet  on  the  brewery  wall  testifies  to 


202  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  fact  that  here  it  used  to  be  ;  but  Park  Street,  as 
it  is  now  ironically  called,  has  lost  all  its  happier 
aspect,  as  well  as  its  theatre — it  is  as  sombre  and 
hideous  a  street  as  any  in  London  ;  spanned  at  one 
end  by  the  railway  arches,  shut  in  by  great  gloomy 
buildings,  there  is  something,  blind  and  deaf  and 
infinitely  depressing  in  the  very  look  of  it  ;  and  if 
you  follow  the  street  to  its  end  it  takes  you  into 
Clink  Street,  which  marks  what  were  once  the  Liber- 
ties of  the  horrible  old  Prison  of  that  name.  It  and 
other  of  the  streets  round  it,  are  composed  solely  of 
mighty  flour  mills,  factories,  warehouses — nobody 
lives  in  them,  and  if  you  traverse  them  of  an  evening 
after  they  are  all  closed,  they  wear  a  grim,  forbidding 
aspect,  there  is  a  sense  of  vague  terror  hovering  in 
the  air  of  those  gaunt,  narrow,  high,  utterly  silent  and 
deserted  thoroughfares,  as  if  they  were  streets  in  a 
city  of  the  dead,  or  as  if  the  blight  of  the  old  Prison 
lay  heavy  upon  them — as  if  it  rose  like  a  foul  miasma 
from  the  ground  on  which  so  many  sorry  rascals 
and  poor  wretches  have  suffered,  rose,  when  the  twi- 
light came  and  the  warehouses  were  all  locked  up  and 
the  workers  departed,  and  drifted  up  between  the  tall, 
close  walls,  over  the  pinched,  crooked  roadways,  to 
make  the  night  here  darker,  lonelier  and  more  haunted 
with  dread  than  it  is  in  places  that  are  not  built  where 
so  many  lives  have  been  brutally  wasted  and  so  much 
misery  endured. 

But  we  have  done  with  the  South  of  the  Thames. 
We  are  going  back  to  Southwark  Bridge  and  over  it  ; 
up  Cannon  Street  to  St.  Paul's,  which  we  have  already 
seen  from  a  distance  when  we  leaned  with  Laurence 
Waller  over  the  wooden  wall  of  Bankside. 


CHAPTER  IX 

IN   THE   SHADOW   OF   ST.    PAUL's 

THIS  is  not  the  St.  Paul's  that  the  Elizabethans 
knew  :  the  St.  Paul's  that  had  the  little  chapel 
of  St.  Faith  down  in  its  crypt,  when  Beaumont  and 
Fletcher  made  Humphrey,  in  The  Knight  of  the  Burning 
Pestle,  swear  that,  since  his  wife  had  gone  from  him  he 
would,  in  the  dark, 

wear  out  my  shoe-soles 
In  passion,  in  Saint  Faith's  church  under  Paul's. 

That  St.  Paul's  had  a  steeple,  and  its  nave  was  a 
meeting  place  for  all  the  gentlemen  about  town,  and 
a  market-place  for  pedlars  and  costcrmongcrs,  till 
the  state  of  things  became  a  crying  scandal  and  had 
to  be  put  an  end  to.  The  plays  of  the  old  dramatists 
are  full  of  references  to  it  and  its  steeple,  and  the 
motley  crowd  that  met  and  transacted  business  and 
occasionally  fought  duels  in  its  nave.  It  is  that 
earlier  building  that  stands  in  Ainsworth's  Old  St. 
Paul's,  and  he  sends  the  weird,  half-mad  Solomon 
Eagle  up  to  walk  on  its  high  parapet  carrying  his 
brazier  of  blazing  charcoal  and  shouting  forth  warnings 
of  doom  over  the  plague-smitten  City.  Old  St.  Paul's 
was  destroyed  in  the  Cir(;at  Fire,  l)ut  the  new  one,  that 
Wren  built  in  its  place,  is  old  now  and  rich  in  associa- 
tions of  its  own. 

203 


204  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON    . 

It  has  been  the  scene  of  many  notable  events  in 
the  nation's  history  ;  under  its  aisles  great  men,  as 
Nelson  and  Wellington,  Reynolds,  Turner,  Millais, 
Leighton,  Sullivan,  lie  buried, 

Here  in  streaming  London's  central  roar, 

and  a  multitude  of  men  famous  the  world  over  have 
entered  its  splendid  portals  one  time  or  another  in 
the  last  two  centuries.  "  Seeing  the  door  of  St.  Paul's, 
under  one  of  the  semicircular  porches,  was  partially 
open,"  writes  Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  recording  his 
own  visit  to  London,  "  I  went  in,  and  found  that  the 
afternoon  service  was  about  to  be  performed  ;  so  I 
remained  to  hear  it,  and  to  see  what  I  could  of  the 
cathedral.  ...  It  is  pleasant  to  stand  in  the  centre 
of  the  cathedral,"  he  adds,  writing  of  his  rovings  about 
it  after  the  service,  "  and  hear  the  noise  of  London, 
loudest  aU  round  this  spot — how  it  is  calmed  into  a 
sound  as  proper  to  be  heard  through  the  aisles  as  the 
sound  of  its  own  organ."  The  sight  of  the  great 
dome  dominating  London,  soaring  high  above  it. 

Afloat  upon  etherial  tides, 

as  John  Davidson  has  it,  impressed  John  Browdie,  of 
Nicholas  Nicklehy,  when  he  and  'Tilda  saw  it  from  the 
top  of  the  coach  as  they  rode  into  London  down  St. 
Martin's  le  Grand,  from  the  north,  no  less  than  it 
impressed  the  negro,  Gumbo,  when  he  and  young  Clive 
Newcome  saw  it  as  they  rode  into  London  over  London 
Bridge,  from  the  south  ;  and  Hood  gives  you  a  notion 
of  what  London  looks  like  when  you  view  it  from  above 
the  dome,  in  his  Moral  Reflections  on  the  Cross  of  St. 
Paul's  : 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       205 

The  man  that  pays  his  pence  and  goes 

Up  to  thy  lofty  crosSj  St.  Paul's, 
Looks  over  London's  naked  nose  : 
Women  and  men. 
The  world  is  all  beneath  his  ken, 
He  sits  above  the  Ball, 
He  seems  on  mount  Olympus'  top 
Among  the  gods,  by  Jupiter  !  and  lets  drop 
His  eyes  from  the  empyreal  clouds 
On  mortal  crowds. 

Seen  from  these  skies 

How  small  those  emmets  in  our  eyes  !   .   .   . 
Oh  !  what  are  men  ? — Beings  so  small 

That  should  I  fall 
Upon  their  little  heads  I  must 
Crush  them  by  hundreds  into  dust ! 

Out  of  The  Bell  of  St.  Paul's  came  Althea  into  St. 
Paul's  Churchyard  with  her  old  father,  the  poet, 
Mr.  Indagine,  who  was  hankering  to  revisit  the  haunts 
of  his  youth  : 

"  They  stood  at  last  on  the  steps  of  St.  Paul's,  and  looked 
down  upon  the  crowd  of  Ludgate  Hill.  '  Thus  I  stood,'  said 
the  Poet,  '  more  than  thirty  years  ago.  It  was  midnight,  but 
the  streets  were  crowded,  because  the  City  was  illuminated 
for  the  Peace.'  .  .  .  They  descended  the  steps.  '  Let  us  pay 
a  visit  to  the  Row,'  he  said  ;  '  it  is  long  since  my  eyes  were 
gladdened  with  a  sight  of  the  only  trade  worth  attention.'  " 

He  took  her  through  a  narrow  passage — there  are 
half  a  dozen  narrow  passages  on  the  northern  side  of 
the  Churchyard — into  Paternoster  Row,  still  as  almost 
wholly  devoted  to  publishing  as  it  was  four  or  five 
centuries  ago,  and  still  the  same  narrow,  cart-blocked 
thoroughfare  it  was  when  Southey  went  there  to  call 
on  his  publishers,  the  Longmans,  who  are  stUl  there, 


206  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

when  Chatterton  hovered  about  the  Chapter  Coffee 
House,  some  remnant  of  which  remains  in  the  new 
building  at  the  corner  of  Chapter  House  Court,  and 
when  Charlotte  Bronte  put  up,  for  a  few  days,  in  the 
same  celebrated  establishment,  which  had  earlier 
associations  too  with  Goldsmith  and  his  contempor- 
aries. Pendennis's  publisher,  Mr  Bungay,  had  his 
shop  in  Paternoster  Row,  and  on  a  memorable  occasion 
Pendennis  and  Warrington  drove  to  his  door  in  a 
carriage,  to  attend  a  dinner  that  Bungay  was  giving 
to  his  friends  and  clients.  The  dinner  was  furnished 
by  the  caterer  Griggs,  of  St.  Paul's  Churchyard,  and 
one  of  the  waiters,  "  a  very  bow-windowed  man," 
was,  according  to  the  humorist,  Wagg,  "  an  under- 
taker in  Amen  Corner,  and  attends  funerals  and 
dinners."  We  will  go  the  western  end  of  Paternoster 
Row,  which  is  Amen  Comer,  with  Althea  and  Mr. 
Indagine,  before  we  return  to  the  Churchyard  : 

"  He  led  the  way  down  the  Row  to  the  end  where  wooden 
gates  stood  at  the  end  of  a  broad  court.  '  My  dear,  it  is  Amen 
Corner/  he  said.  '  Let  us  look  in.  I  remember  coming  here 
day  after  day,  thinking  how  quiet  and  happy  must  be  those 
who  lived  in  this  Cloister.'  ...  He  opened  the  gate  and  led 
the  way  into  the  place  :  there  is  a  row  of  quiet  looking  houses 
and  then  one  turns  into  a  broad  court  covered  with  ground  ivy 
instead  of  grass,  but  with  a  few  flower  beds  and  trees  and  red- 
gabled  buildings,  with  an  archway  in  red  brick  like  a  college." 

It  is  all  there,  as  they  saw  it  ;  but  we  leave  them 
going  on  into  Ludgate  Hill,  and  go  back  to  St.  Paul's 
Churchyard.  Scattered  round  the  Churchyard  once 
were  the  shops  of  publishers  ;  you  may  find  the  names 
and  signs  of  them  recorded  on  the  title-pages  of 
hundreds    of    Elizabethan    and    Georgian    volumes. 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       207 

But  nowadays  it  is  mostly  given  over  to  the  silk, 
cotton  and  woollen  trades  ;  and  I  like  to  remember 
that  W.  B.  Rands  (Matthew  Browne)  in  1866  dedi- 
cated a  volume  of  his  essays  (and  he  is  an  essayist 
too  much  and  too  foolishly  neglected)  to  "  George 
Bowness  Carr,  Esquire,  of  Westmoreland  and  London, 
Merchant,  and  all  Friends  round  St.  Paul's  ;  "  from 
which  I  take  it  he  was  someway  connected  with  Mr. 
Carr's  business — had  possibly  been  a  clerk  in  his 
warehouse  here. 

"  Walking  without  any  definite  object  through  St. 
Paul's  Churchyard,"  you  read  in  one  of  the  Sketches 
by  Boz,  "  we  happened  to  turn  down  a  street  entitled 
'  Paul's  Chain,'  and  keeping  straight  forward  for  a 
few  hundred  yards,  found  ourselves,  as  a  natural 
consequence,  in  Doctors'  Commons  ; "  and  there 
follows  a  description  of  the  old  Divorce  Court  that  is 
there  no  longer.  "  '  Boots,'  said  Mr.  Jingle  to  Sam 
Weller,  in  a  room  of  that  White  Hart,  where  we  saw 
him  in  our  last  chapter,  '  Do  you  know — what's  a- 
name — Doctors'  Commons  ?  '  '  Yes,  sir.'  '  Where  is 
it  ?  '  '  Paul's  Churchyard,  sir  ;  low  archway  on  the 
carriage  side,  bookseller's  at  one  corner,  hot-el  on  the 
(jther,  and  twV)  porters  in  the  middle  as  touts  for 
licences.'  .  .  .  '  What  do  they  do  ?  '  inquired  the 
gentleman. 

"  '  Do  !  You,  sir  !  That  an't  the  worst  on  it,  neither.  They 
put  things  into  old  gen'lm'ns  heads  as  they  never  dreamed  of. 
My  father,  sir,  vos  a  coachman.  A  vidower  he  vos,  and  fat 
enough  for  anything — uncommon  fat,  to  be  sure.  His  missus 
dies,  and  leaves  him  four  hundred  pound.  Down  he  goes  to 
the  Commons,  to  see  the  lawyer  and  draw  the  blunt — wery 
smart — top    boots    on — nosegay    in    his    button-hole — broad- 


208  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

brimmed  tile — green  shawl — quite  the  gen'lm'n.    Goes  through 

the  archvay,  thinking  how  he  should  inwest  the  money — up 
comes  the  touter,  touches  his  hat — '  Licence,  sir,  licence  ?  ' — 
'  What's  that  ?  '  says  my  father.  '  Licence,  sir/  says  he, — 
'  What  licence  ?  '  says  my  father. — '  Marriage  licence/  says  the 
touter. — '  Dash  my  veskit/  says  my  father,  '  I  never  thought 
o'  that.' — '  I  think  you  wants  one,  sir,'  says  the  touter.  My 
father  pulls  up,  and  thinks  a  bit — '  No,'  says  he,  '  damme,  I'm 
too  old,  b'sides  I'm  a  many  sizes  too  large,'  says  he. — '  Not  a  bit 
on  it,  sir,'  says  the  touter. — '  Think  not  ?  '  says  my  father. — 
'  I'm  sure  not,'  says  he  ;  'we  married  a  gen'lm'n  twice  your  size 
last  Monday.' — '  Did  you,  though,'  says  my  father. — '  To  be 
sure  ve  did,'  says  the  touter,  '  you're  a  babby  to  him — this  vay, 
sir — this  vay  ! ' — and  sure  enough  my  father  walks  arter  him, 
like  a  tame  monkey  behind  a  horgan,  into  a  little  back  office, 
vere  a  feller  sat  among  dirty  papers  and  tin  boxes,  making 
believe  to  be  busy.  '  Pray  take  a  seat,  vile  I  makes  out  the 
affadavit,  sir,'  says  the  lawyer. — '  Thankee,  sir,'  says  my  father, 
and  down  he  sat  and  stared  vith  all  his  eyes,  and  his  mouth 
vide  open,  at  the  names  on  the  boxes. — '  What's  your  name, 
sir  ?  '  says  the  lawyer. — '  Tony  Weller,'  says  my  father. — 
'  Parish  ?  '  says  the  lawyer. — '  Belle  Savage,'  says  my  father ; 
for  he  stopped  there  ven  he  drove  up,  and  he  know'd  nothing 
about  parishes,  he  didn't.  '  And  what's  the  lady's  name  ?  ' 
says  the  lawyer.  My  father  was  struck  all  of  a  heap.  '  Blessed 
if  I  know,'  says  he. — '  Not  know  ! '  says  the  lawyer. — '  No  more 
nor  you  do,'  says  my  father,  '  can't  I  put  that  in  arterwards  ?  ' 
— '  Impossible  ! '  says  the  lawyer — '  Wery  well,'  says  my 
father,  after  he'd  thought  a  moment,  '  put  down  Mrs  Clarke.' — 
'  What  Clarke  ?  '  says  the  lawyer,  dipping  his  pen  in  the  ink. — 
'  Susan  Clarke,  Markis  o'  Granby,  Dorking,'  says  my  father ; 
'  she'll  have  me,  if  I  ask  her,  I  des-say — I  never  said  nothing 
to  her,  but  she'll  have  me,  I  know.'  The  licence  was  made  out, 
and  she  did  have  him,  and  what's  more  she's  got  him  now ; 
and  /  never  had  any  of  the  four  hundred  pound,  worse  luck  ! '  " 

David  Copperfield  was  articled  to  a  firm  of  proctors, 
Messrs.  Spenlow  and  Jorkins,  in  Doctors'  Commons, 


\'m 'Vfoif^J  W""^- ,,^f^  r.  V  ./-.it 


Tlu  iiii-ctiii):  /ilncc  »/  Tom  I'incli  am/  /lis  sister,  in  "  Mmtiii  ChuzzU-ivit." 

Chafiler  lo 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       209 

"  a  lazy  old  nook  near  St.  Paul's  Churchyard  ...  a 
little  out-of-the-way  place  where  they  administer 
ecclesiastical  law  ;  "  or  used  to  until  the  New  Law 
Courts  were  built  in  the  Strand.  He  called  for  his 
Aunt,  Betsy  Trotwood,  at  her  rooms  in  Lincoln's 
Inn  Fields,  and  they  went  afoot  by  Fleet  Street  and 
up  Ludgate  Hill,  to  St.  Paul's  Churchyard.  In 
Ludgate  Hill,  she  was  startled  by  the  sight  of  that 
mysterious,  miserable  rascal,  her  husband — the  pitiful 
wretch  of  whose  existence  David  had  no  knowledge, 
and  who  was  secretly  blackmailing  her.  She  told 
Copperfield  to  call  a  coach  for  her,  and  to  go  on  and 
wait  in  St.  Paul's  Churchyard  ;  he  saw  her  and  the 
man  get  into  the  coach  here  and  drive  on,  and  after 
he  had  waited  half  an  hour  in  the  Churchyard  for  her, 
she  came  back  in  the  coach  alone,  and  they  con- 
tinued their  journey  together.  "  Doctors'  Commons 
was  approached  by  a  little  low  archway.  Before  wc 
had  taken  many  places  down  the  street  beyond  it, 
the  noise  of  the  city  seemed  to  melt  as  if  by  magic, 
into  a  softened  distance.  A  few  dull  courts  and 
narrow  ways  brought  us  to  the  sky-lighted  offices  of 
Spenlow  and  Jorkins."  Here  David  Copperfield 
came  daily  to  study  his  profession  ;  here  he  dreamed 
and  was  happy  and  wretched  in  his  wild  love  for  Dora 
Spenlow  ;  and  one  day  he  accompanied  Mr.  Spenlow 
to  "a  certain  coffee-house,  which  in  those  days  had 
a  door  opening  into  the  Commons,  just  within  the 
little  archway  in  St.  Paul's  Churchyard,"  and  there 
he  found  Miss  Murdstone  awaiting  him  :  she  had  dis- 
covered that  he  loved  Dora  and  was  writing  lo  her, 
had  intercepted  his  letters  and  betrayed  him  to  Mr. 
Spenlow,  who  demanded  his  daughter's  letters  back 

14 


210  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  declared  that  all  this  "  youthful  folly  "  must  be 
at  an  end. 

The  archway  is  gone  within  the  last  year  or  two, 
but  here  still  is  the  street,  the  last  on  the  left  before 
you  reach  Ludgate  HUl — the  street  down  which  David 
and  Betsy  Trotwood  walked,  and  at  the  entrance  to 
which  Mr.  Weller  was  waylaid  by  the  tout.  More 
recently,  Mr.  Gammon,  of  Gissing's  Town  Traveller 
came  with  Mr.  Clover,  otherwise  Lord  Polperro,  into 
St.  Paul's  Churchyard,  and  witnessed  a  scene  that 
happens  there  still  at  the  end  of  every  year.  Their 
cab  ascended  Ludgate  Hill  with  difficulty  through 
a  mob  that  was  going  the  same  way  :  "  the  people 
were  thronging  to  hear  St.  Paul's  strike  the  midnight 
hour  ;  "  and  when  Gammon  found  that  Mr.  Greenacre 
was  not  waiting  for  them  at  the  Bilboes,  he  suggested 
that  he  and  Polperro  should  stroll  back  to  St.  Paul's 
and  look  at  the  crowd  : 

"  It  seemed  probable  that  when  they  had  gone  a  little  distance 
Lord  Polperro  would  feel  shaky  and  consent  to  take  a  cab. 
Drink,  however,  had  invigorated  the  man  ;  he  reeled  a  little 
and  talked  very  huskily,  but  declared  that  the  walk  was 
enjoyable. 

"  '  Let's  get  into  the  crowd,  Gammon,  I  like  a  crowd.  What 
are  those  bells  ringing  for  ?  Yes,  yes,  of  course,  I  remember — 
New  Year's  Eve.  I  had  no  idea  that  people  came  here  to  see 
the  New  Year  in.  I  shall  come  again.  I  shall  come  every 
year  ;  it's  most  enjoyable.' 

"  They  entered  the  Churchyard,  and  were  soon  amid  a  noisy, 
hustling  throng,  an  assembly  composed  of  clerks,  roughs  and 
pickpockets,  with  a  sprinkling  of  well-to-do  rowdies,  and 
numerous  girls  or  women,  whose  shrieks,  screams  and  yelps 
sounded  above  the  deeper  notes  of  masculine  uproar.  Gammon, 
holding  tight  to  his  companion's  arm,  endeavoured  to  pilot 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       211 

him  in  the  direction  where  the  crowd  was  thinnest,  still  moving 
westward  ;  but  Lord  Polperro  caught  the  contagion  of  the 
tumult  and  began  pressing  vehemently  into  the  surging  massi 

"  '  This  does  me  good,  Gammon.  It's  a  long  time  since 
I've  mixed  with  people.  I  always  enjoyed  a  crowd.  Hollo — 
o — o  ! '  His  excited  shout  made  him  cough  terribly  ;  none 
the  less  he  pushed  on. 

"  '  You'll  come  to  harm/  said  the  other.  '  Don't  be  a  fool  ; 
get  out  of  this.' 

"  A  struggle  began  between  them.  .  .  .  Lord  Polperro  did 
not  resent  the  tugs  at  his  arm  ;  he  took  it  for  genial  horseplay, 
and  only  shouted  louder.  .  .  .  Blackguards  in  front  of  him 
were  bellowing  a  filthy  song  ;  his  lordship  tried  to  join  in  the 
melody.  A  girl  who  was  jammed  against  him  shot  liquid  into 
his  ear  out  of  a  squirt,  and  another  of  her  kind  knocked  his 
hat  off.  .  .  .  Polperro  happened  to  press  against  a  drunken 
woman  ;  she  caught  him  by  his  disordered  hair  and  tugged  at 
it,  yelling  into  his  face.  To  release  himself  he  bent  forward, 
pushing  the  woman  away  ;  the  result  was  a  violent  blow 
from  her  fist,  after  which  she  raised  a  shriek  as  if  of  pain  or 
terror.  Instantly  a  man  sprang  forward  to  her  defence,  and  he, 
too,  planted  his  fist  between  the  eyes  of  the  hapless  peer." 

Gammon  tackled  this  rough,  the  fighting  became 
more  or  less  general,  in  the  thick  of  it  Polperro  fell  ; 
the  police  interfered  and  Gammon  was  swept  away 
in  the  rush.  "  From  church  towers  east  and  west 
the  chimes  rang  merrily  for  the  New  Year.  Softly 
fell  the  snow  from  a  black  sky,  and  was  forthwith 
trodden  into  slush."  Presently,  when  Gammon  had 
managed  to  struggle  back  to  the  scene  of  the  disturb- 
ance, he  found  Lord  Polperro  lying  unconscious  with 
a  ring  of  police  round  him,  and  after  he  had  revealed 
the  identity  of  the  injured  man  they  took  him  in 
a  cab  to  St.  Bartholomew's  Hospital,  in  Smithheld, 
where  he  ended  by  dying  of  his  injuries. 


212  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

On  the  Sunday  evening  of  his  arrival  in  London, 
Arthur  Clennam,  of  Little  Dorrit,  oppressed  by  the 
gloom  of  a  London  Sunday,  "  sat  in  the  window  of  the 
coffee-house  on  Ludgate  Hill,  counting  one  of  the 
neighbouring  bells,  making  sentences  and  burdens  of 
songs  out  of  it  in  spite  of  himself,  and  wondering  how 
many  sick  people  it  might  be  the  death  of  in  the 
course  of  the  year.  ...  He  sat  in  the  same  place  as 
the  day  died,  looking  at  the  dull  houses  opposite,  and 
thinking,  if  the  disembodied  spirits  of  former  in- 
habitants were  ever  conscious  of  them,  how  they 
must  pity  themselves  for  their  old  places  of  imprison- 
ment. .  .  .  Presently  the  rain  began  to  fall  in 
slanting  lines  between  him  and  those  houses.  .  .  . 
In  the  country,  the  rain  would  have  developed  a 
thousand  fresh  scents,  and  every  drop  would  have 
had  its  bright  association  with  some  beautiful  form  or 
growth  of  life.  In  the  city,  it  developed  only  foul 
stale  smells,  and  was  a  sickly,  lukewarm,  dirt-stained, 
wretched  addition  to  the  gutters."  He  watched  a 
crowd  sheltering  "  under  the  public  archway  opposite," 
which  must  have  been  the  arch  into  Ludgate  Square, 
and  enables  you  to  locate  the  position  of  the  coffee- 
house. Putting  on  his  hat  and  coat,  Clennam  went 
out  through  this  dismal  weather,  "  crossed  by  St. 
Paul's,"  and  made  his  way  towards  that  decaying  old 
house  of  his  mother's  down  by  Thames  Street. 

The  Citizen's  Wife,  sitting  as  one  of  the  audience, 
in  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  Knight  of  the  Burning 
Pestle,  alarmed  by  the  threats  of  Jasper,  in  the  scene 
on  the  stage,  shouts  to  her  husband  :  "  Away,  George, 
away  !  raise  the  watch  at  Ludgate,  and  bring  a 
mittimus  from  the  justice  for  this  desperate  villain  !  " 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       213 

The  watch-house  was  by  the  gate,  and  Liid  Gate  barred 
the  Hill  just  on  the  city  side  of  Old  BaUey,  until 
towards  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century.  In 
Webster's  indifferent  drama,  The  Famous  History  of 
Sir  Thomas  Wyatt,  he  brings  Wyatt  to  Lud  Gate, 
heading  a  rebellion  against  Mary,  in  favour  of  Lady 
Elizabeth.  He  and  his  handful  of  adherents  come 
up  from  Fleet  Street,  and  are  halted  here  : 

Soft !  this  is  Ludgate  :  stand  aloof ;  I'll  knock. 

He  knocks,  and  the  Earl  of  Pembroke  appearing  on 
the  walls  scoffs  at  Wyatt's  demand  to 

Open  your  gates,  you  lowering  citizens, 

and  threatens  to  turn  his  cannon  on  them  unless  they 
leave  the  city  gates  without  delay.  Wyatt  feels  that 
discretion  is  the  better  part,  and  orders  his  troops  to 
"  march  back  towards  Fleet  Street,"  and  on  the  way, 
disheartened  by  this  failure,  they  fall  from  him  and, 
deserted  and  alone,  he  is  soon  captured  without 
difficulty. 

Near  the  foot  of  Ludgate  Hill,  on  the  right,  is  La 
Belle  Sauvage,  the  old  inn  yard  that  Mr.  Weller 
named  as  his  parish,  because  it  happened  to  be  the 
stopping  place  of  the  coach  he  drove.  The  yard 
keeps  its  ancient  shape,  but  you  will  find  nothing  of 
the  inn  there,  nor  of  the  house  in  which  Grinling 
(iibbons  used  to  live. 

Before  we  pa.ss  on  into  Fleet  Street,  turn  aside  to 
the  right  up  Farringdon  Street,  for  all  along  here, 
on  the  right-hand  side  of  the  way,  where  the  Memorial 
Hall  is.  Fleet  Prison  used  to  stand.  When  Lady 
Fnigal,   in   Massinger's   City   Madam  is   preparing   a 


214  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

banquet,  she  asks  her  steward  what  cooks  he  has 
provided.  "  The  best  of  the  city,"  he  assures  her  : 
"  they've  wrought  at  my  Lord  Mayor's,"  but  her 
daughter  Anne  ejaculates  scornfully  : 

Fie  on  them  !  they  smell  of  Fleet  Lane  and  Pie  Corner ! 

Fleet  Lane  is  here,  the  first  turning  you  come  to 
in  Farringdon  Street  :  Pie  Corner  you  have  seen  in 
Smithfield.  Fleet  Ditch  ran  in  the  middle  of  Far- 
ringdon Street ;  Fleet  Market  was  a-litter  and  a-roar 
on  either  side  of  it.  When  Kitty  Pleydell  came  to 
London,  after  the  death  of  her  father,  to  look  for  her 
uncle,  the  Rev.  Gregory  Shovel,  she  and  her  maid 
were  directed  by  a  maid  at  the  St.  Paul's  Coffee-house 
to  tell  their  coachman  to  drive  them  "  down  Ludgate 
Hill  and  up  the  Fleet  Market  on  the  prison  side  ;  he 
may  stop  at  the  next  house  to  the  third  Pen  and 
Hand.  You  will  find  the  doctor's  name  written  on  a 
card  in  the  window."  He  was,  in  fact,  in  Prison  for 
debt,  but  was  allowed  to  live  in  the  Liberties,  which 
extended  to  certain  houses  and  streets  outside  the 
walls,  and  there  he  carried  on  his  profession,  as  a 
Doctor  of  Divinity,  and  was  so  famous  for  his  conduct 
of  those  shameful  but  legal  unions  known  as  Fleet 
Marriages,  that  he  had  been  nicknamed  the  Chaplain 
of  the  Fleet.  There  and  thus  they  found  him,  and 
learned  from  his  clerical  tout  that  he  drove  a  brisk 
trade  in  weddings  at  a  guinea  apiece,  and  in  The 
Chaplain  of  the  Fleet  Besant  gives  you  an  excellent 
picture  of  the  Prison  as  it  was  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  and  of  the  motley,  drunken,  squalid,  wasted 
lives  that  were  lived  in  it.  Hoyst,  in  The  City  Madam, 
being  arrested  for  debt  cries  out  recklessly  : 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       215 

Do  your  worsts  I  care  not^ 
I'll  be  removed  to  the  Fleet  and  drink  and  drab  there 
In  spite  of  your  teeth. 

But  one  could  fill  a  book  with  the  literary  associations 
of  the  Fleet  Prison  of  those  days,  and  earlier  and 
later.  The  brilliant,  shiftless  journalist,  Shandon,  in 
Pendennis,  lived  with  his  wife  and  family  and  worked 
in  the  Fleet  Prison  ;  he  started  and  edited  "  The  Pall 
Mall  Gazette "  from  there,  and  Warrington  and 
Pendennis,  two  of  his  staff,  found  him  in  his  room 
there,  engaged  with  his  publisher  : 

"  Pen  had  never  seen  this  scene  of  London  life,  and  walked 
with  no  small  interest  in  at  the  grim  gate  of  that  dismal  edifice. 
They  went  through  the  anteroom,  where  the  officers  and 
janitors  of  the  place  were  seated,  and  passing  in  at  the  wicket, 
entered  the  prison.  The  noise  and  the  crowd,  the  life  and 
the  shouting,  the  shabby  bustle  of  the  place,  struck  and  excited 
Pen.  People  moved  about  ceaselessly  and  restless,  like  caged 
animals  in  a  menagerie.  Men  were  playing  at  fives.  Others 
pacing  and  tramping  :  this  one  in  colloquy  with  his  lawyer 
in  dingy  black — that  one  walking  sadly,  with  his  wife  by  his 
side  and  a  child  on  his  arm.  Some  were  arrayed  in  tattered 
dressing  gowns,  and  had  a  look  of  rakish  fashion.  Everj^body 
seemed  to  be  busy,  humming,  and  on  the  move.  Pen  felt  as 
if  he  choked  in  the  place,  and  as  if  the  door  being  locked  upon 
him  they  would  never  let  him  out.  They  went  through  a  court, 
up  a  stone  staircase,  and  through  passages  full  of  people,  and 
noise,  and  cross  lights,  and  black  doors  dapping  and  banging  ; 
Pen  feeling  as  one  docs  in  a  feverish  morning  dream." 

Shandon,  in  his  careless,  haphazard  style,  was  not 
altogether  unhappy  amid  these  surroundings  ;  it  was 
sad  enough  for  his  wife,  who  felt  their  position  keenly, 
and  was  lonely  and  outcast,  but  he  had  his  work  to 


216  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

do,  and  found  alleviation  in  drinking  freely  with  the 
other  inmates. 

To  the  Fleet  Prison  Mr,  Pickwick  was  conveyed 
when  he  refused  to  pay  the  damages  awarded  to  Mrs. 
Bardell  in  her  breach  of  promise  action,  and  you  will 
know  from  the  Pickwick  Papers  what  a  vile,  barbarous, 
pitiful,  heart-breaking  place  the  prison  was  in  its 
latter  days.  For  Mr.  Pickwick,  with  his  natural 
benevolence,  went  about  among  the  humours  and  the 
tragedies  of  it,  saw  the  disorder  and  bestial  dissipa- 
tions of  it,  and  the  dirt,  the  hideous  poverty  and 
blank  despair  that  were  shut  up  ruthlessly  within  it. 
He  could  pity  Mr.  Jingle  when  he  came  upon  him, 
haggard  and  destitute,  herded  with  the  poorest  of 
the  poor  prisoners.  There  was  a  Chancery  prisoner 
there,  who  had  been  in  "  long  enough  to  have  lost 
friends,  fortune,  home  and  happiness  and  to  have 
acquired  the  right  of  having  a  room  to  himself  ;  " 
and  when  Mr.  Pickwick,  for  his  greater  comfort,  was 
induced  by  the  turnkey  to  bargain  with  this  shabby, 
gaunt,  cadaverous  wretch  for  the  hire  of  his  room, 
and  then,  with  some  touch  of  compunction,  begged 
him  to  consider  it  his  own  still,  when  he  wanted  to 
rest  in  quiet,  or  see  any  friends  who  came  to  visit 
him,  this  man  broke  out  vehemently  into  language 
that  to  some  may  seem  melodramatic,  but  to  me 
seems  natural  and  true,  in  such  circumstances,  and 
to  speak  not  for  himself  only,  but  for  hundreds  of 
broken,  hopeless  creatures  who  wore  their  lives  out 
uselessly  in  that  accursed  place  : 

"  Friends  !  "  interposed  the  man^  in  a  voice  which  rattled 
in  his  throat.     "  If  I  lay  dead  at  the  bottom  of  the  deepest 


IN  THE  SHADOW  OF  ST.  PAUL'S       217 

mine  in  the  world,  tight  screwed  down  and  soldered  in  my 
coffin,  rotting  in  the  dark  and  filthy  ditch  that  drags  its  slime 
along  beneath  the  foundations  of  this  prison,  I  could  not  be 
more  forgotten  or  unheeded  than  I  am  here.  I  am  a  dead 
man — dead  to  society,  without  the  pity  they  bestow  on  those 
whose  souls  have  passed  to  judgment.  Friends  to  see  me  ! 
My  God  !  I  have  sunk  from  the  prime  of  life  into  old  age  in 
tlus  place,  and  there  is  not  one  to  raise  his  hand  above  my  bed, 
when  I  lie  dead  upon  it,  and  say  '  It  is  a  blessing  he  is  gone  ! '  " 

That  was  the  unutterably  damnable  state  of  things 
that  showed  no  sign  of  coming  to  an  end  so  long  as 
the  mass  of  men  were  persuaded  that  they  were  unfit 
to  rule  themselves  and  were  humbly  contented  to  be 
ruled  by  what  is  still  sometimes  called  "  the  governing 
class."  When  I  glance  over  old  maps  and  notice 
that  London  used  to  have  more  prisons  in  it  than 
schools  and  nearly  as  many  prisons  as  churches,  and 
when  I  remember  that  the  debtors'  prisons  were  not 
abolished  and  the  rest  conducted  decently,  humanely, 
until  the  democracy  had  begun  to  become  articulate 
and  to  insist  on  taking  a  hand  in  its  own  control,  I 
am  incredulous  and  amused  at  those  arrogant  persons 
who  tell  us  that  none  but  the  caste  which  used  to 
govern  us  so  disgracefully,  and  with  such  unintelligent 
legal  juggleries,  is  competent  to  make  laws,  and  that 
there  is  peril  in  democratic  government.  I  never  pass 
along  this  side  of  Farringdon  Street  without  recalling 
that  old  prison,  and  the  cry  of  that  man  who  sym- 
bolised so  many  thousands  of  wasted  lives  that 
withered  in  it.  Look  up  the  byvvays  that  run  in  to 
where  once  were  the  prison  walls  or  over  what  Wcis 
once  the  prison  ground — they  are  all  blind  alleys, 
and  arc  bleak  and  shadowed,  on  summer  nonn'^  when 


218  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Farringdon  Street  is  flooded  with  sunlight,  as  if  here, 
as  in  Clink  Street,  the  gloom  of  the  old  prison  hangs 
over  the  spot  even  yet  and  some  sense  of  the  intoler- 
able wrong  and  suffering  that  have  been  endured  here 
rose  from  the  very  earth,  like  an  exhalation  from  the 
past,  and  could  not  be  forgotten. 


CHAPTER  X 

FLEET   STREET  AND   THE   TEMPLE 

IT  may  seem  impossible  to  write  of  Fleet  Street 
and  say  nothing  of  Dr.  Johnson  and  his  friends, 
or  of  the  Temple  without  saying  something  of  Charles 
Lamb,  but  we  are  going  to  come  as  near  to  doing  that 
as  wc  can.  With  these  and  other  such  realities  we 
have  really  no  business  here,  and  there  are  far  more 
of  our  imaginary  people  connected  with  both  places 
than  I  could  hope  to  introduce  within  the  compass 
of  this  chapter.  I  shall  not  attempt  to  even  cata- 
logue all  such  who  have  gone  up  and  down  the  street, 
but  I  seldom  pass  the  pawnshop  next  door  to  Racquet 
Court  without  recalling  that  the  hero  of  Christie 
Murray's  fine  novel,  Rainbow  Gold,  loitered  outside 
it  gazing  in  at  its  window  ;  or  Shoe  Lane  without 
recollecting  that  Dickens  brings  a  busload  of  mis- 
cellaneous characters  up  Fleet  Street,  in  the  Sketches 
by  Boz,  dropping  one  at  the  Lane,  and  another  at 
Farringdon  Street,  on  the  way  to  the  Bank  ;  Mr. 
Puff,  in  Foote's  farce,  The  Patron,  reproaching  the 
hack  journalist,  Dactyl,  with  ingratitude,  cries,  "  You, 
you  !  What,  I  suppose  you  forget  your  garret  in 
Wine  Office  Court,  when  you  furnished  paragraphs 
for  the  Farthing  Post  at  twelve  pence  a  dozen  !  " 
and  Timothy  Capias,  in  The  Minor,  another  of  Foote's 
farces,  is  one  of  a  club  that   meets  every  Tuesday 

219 


220  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

night  at  the  "  Magpye  and  Horse-Shoe,  Fetter  Lane." 
Pendennis  was  often  in  Fleet  Street ;  Mr.  Theodore 
Bragge,  of  Besant's  Seamy  Side,  had  a  weakness  for 
"  exchanging  ideas  on  current  pohtics  with  a  friend 
in  a  Fleet  Street  tavern  ;  "  Dickens  was  writing  of 
Johnson's  Court,  where  the  Old  Monthly  Magazine 
was  published,  when  he  told  of  how  "  stealthily  one 
evening  at  twilight,  with  fear  and  trembling,"  he 
dropped  his  first  published  story,  "  Mr.  Minns  and 
his  Cousin,"  into  "  a  dark  letter-box  in  a  dark  office 
up  a  dark  court  in  Fleet  Street  ;  "  and  nearly  opposite 
is  PleydeU  Court,  into  which  Dickens  walked  nightly, 
after  he  had  become  famous  and  was  founding  the 
Daily  News  ;  and  all  along  Fleet  Street  came  the  old 
Poet,  Mr.  Indagine  (who  was,  I  confess,  a  bit  of  a 
bore)  revisiting  the  haunts  of  his  youth,  with  Althea, 
in  The  Bell  of  St.  Paul's  : 

"  '  Fleet  Street  at  last  !  '  he  cried,  lifting  his  head 
and  looking  round  him.  '  We  are  in  Fleet  Street  ! 
.  .  .  And  now  my  old  friends  must  be  all  eighty  years 
of  age — eighty  years  of  age  !  '  .  .  .  But  he  continued 
to  look  about  him  as  if  it  were  quite  on  the  cards  that 
he  might  meet  Dickens,  Thackeray  and  Douglas 
Jerrold  marching  arm  in  arm  together,  jovial  and 
hearty  still,  though  eighty  years  of  age.  '  My  dear,' 
he  said,  '  this  is  a  street  of  Taverns,  all  sacred  to  the 
memory  of  England's  Worthies.  There  are  the  Cock, 
the  Cheshire  Cheese,  the  Rainbow,  the  Mitre,  Dick's — 
once  there  was  the  Devil  as  well,  but  they  pulled  it  down 
a  hundred  years  ago.  Cruel  !  To  destroy  the  Apollo 
Chamber,  the  Kingdom  of  Ben  Jonson.'  "  But  one 
might  continue  in  this  style  almost  endlessly,  so  let  us 
make  an  end  of  such  casual  jottings  and  start  afresh. 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE    221 

Up  the  second  turning  on  your  left  in  Fleet  Street 
is  St.  Bride's  Church  ;  Milton  lived  in  one  of  the 
houses  round  the  churchyard,  and  Lovelace  was 
buried  in  the  church  ;  and  here  Gissing  laid  a  scene 
of  his  most  poignant,  most  depressing  short  story, 
"  The  Day  of  Silence,"  in  Htinian  Odds  and  Ends. 
The  Burdens  lived  in  a  court  by  Southwark  Bridge, 
and  a  Saturday  came  when  the  father  went  with  the 
little  son,  Billy,  boating  up  the  river  with  some 
friends,  while  the  mother,  who  was  dying  of  heart 
disease,  went  to  help  at  a  job  of  cleaning  out  some 
offices  in  an  alley  off  Fleet  Street  near  St.  Bride's. 
Having  finished  her  work  ;  never  dreaming  that  there 
had  been  an  accident  on  the  river  and  neither  her 
husband  nor  her  boy  would  ever  return  to  their  home 
— "  She  came  out  into  St.  Bride's  Churchyard,  and 
was  passing  on  towards  Fleet  Street  when  again  the 
anguishing  spasm  seized  upon  her.  She  turned  and 
looked  at  the  seats  under  the  wall  of  the  church, 
where  two  or  three  people  were  resting  in  the  shadowed 
quiet.  It  would  be  better  to  sit  here  for  a  moment. 
Her  weak  and  weary  limbs  bore  her  with  difficulty 
to  the  nearest  bench,  and  she  sank  upon  it  with  a 
sigh.  The  pain  lasted  only  a  minute  or  two,  and  in 
the  relief  that  followed  she  was  glad  to  breathe  the 
air  of  the  little  open  space,  where  she  could  look  up 
at  the  blue  sky  and  enjoy  the  sense  of  repose.  The 
places  of  business  round  about  were  still  vacant  and 
closed  till  Monday  morning.  Only  a  dull  sound  of 
traffic  came  from  the  great  t lion )uglif arc,  near  at 
hand  as  it  was.  And  the  wonderful  sky  made  hor 
think  of  little  BUly  who  was  enjoying  himself  on  the 
river.   .   .   .   They  would  get  back  about  eight  o'clock. 


222  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

most  likely.  Billy  would  be  hungry  ;  he  must  have 
a  bit  of  something  for  supper — fried  liver,  or  perhaps 
some  stewed  steak.  It  was  time  for  her  to  be  moving 
on.  She  stood  up,  but  the  movement  brought  on 
another  attack.  Her  body  sank  together,  her  head 
fell  forwards.  Presently  the  man  who  was  sitting  on 
the  next  bench  began  to  look  at  her ;  he  smiled — 
another  victim  of  the  thirsty  weather  !  And  half  an 
hour  passed  before  it  was  discovered  that  the  woman 
sitting  there  in  the  shadow  of  St.  Bride's  Church  was 
dead." 

Whitefriars  Street  slopes  down  to  the  river  through 
the  centre  of  a  district  that  once  held  a  Carmelite 
Monastery  and  its  gardens  ;  by  the  time  of  James  I. 
the  Monastery  was  gone,  but  the  area  that  had  be- 
longed to  it  retained  its  ancient  right  of  sanctuary 
and  was  a  secure  retreat  for  debtors,  highwaymen, 
cutpurses  and  all  the  blackguards  of  the  town  who 
went  in  danger  of  the  law.  Here,  again,  the  dis- 
reputable character  that  the  place  bore  so  long  con- 
tinues to  assert  itself.  There  is  a  hangdog,  dingy, 
dissipated  air  about  Whitefriars  Street  that  is  curiously 
at  variance  with  the  respectability  of  most  of  its 
buildings  ;  there  are  mean  little  shops  that  seem  at 
home  there,  and  its  furtive,  shabby,  gloomy  alleys 
and  courts  are  the  actual  courts  that  wormed  their 
crooked  ways  through  the  Elizabethan  and  Jacobean 
Alsatia,  which  lay  all  along  here  behind  Fleet  Street 
between  the  Temple  and  the  city  wall.  The  chief 
interest  now  of  Shadwell's  comedy.  The  Squire  of 
Alsatia,  is  that  it  realistically  reproduces  much  of  that 
picturesque,  riotous  region,  and  the  habits,  manners 
and  queer  slang  of  its  inhabitants.     His  characters 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE     223 

include  Cheatly,  "  a  rascal  who  by  reason  of  debts 
dare  not  stir  out  of  Whitefriars,  but  there  inveigles 
young  heirs  in  tail,  and  helps  them  to  goods  and 
money  upon  great  disadvantages  ;  is  bound  for  them, 
and  shares  with  them,  till  he  undoes  them.  A  lewd, 
impudent,  debauched  fellow,  very  expert  in  the  cant 
about  the  town  ;  "  Shamwell,  "  cousin  to  the  Bel- 
fonds,  an  heir,  who  being  ruined  by  Cheatly,  is  made 
a  decoy-duck  for  others  ;  not  daring  to  stir  out  of 
Alsatia,  where  he  lives  ;  "  Captain  Hackum,  "  a  block- 
headed  bully  of  Alsatia ;  a  cowardly,  impudent, 
blustering  fellow  ;  formerly  a  sergeant  in  Flanders, 
run  from  his  colours,  retreated  into  Whitefriars  for  a 
very  small  debt,  where  by  the  Alsatians,  he  is  dubbed 
a  captain  ;  "  Mrs.  Hackum,  who  lets  lodgings  ;  Parson, 
"  an  indebted  Alsatian  divine  ;  "  and  various  other 
gamblers,  cheats,  thieves,  and  rapscallions  ;  to  say 
nothing  of  Sir  William  and  Sir  Edward  Belfond,  and 
the  ne'er-do-weel  son  of  Sir  William,  whose  scandalous 
way  of  life  brings  his  father  and  others  into  the  law- 
less, frowsily  romantic  haunts  of  Whitefriars  in 
search  of  him  ;  and  you  can  track  him  and  them 
here  a  little  to  this  day.  Scrapewell,  a  hypocritical, 
godly  knave  who  lives  by  swindling  young  heirs, 
telling  young  Belfond  how  very  drunk  he  was  the 
night  before,  says,  "  Why,  you  broke  windows ; 
scoured  ;  broke  open  a  house  in  Dorset  Court,  and 
took  a  pretty  wench,  a  gentleman's  natural,  away  by 
force,"  and  later  you  learn  that  this  outrage  has  been 
put  upon  Belfond's  blameless  younger  brother,  who 
has  been  arrested  for  it.  "  He  denied  that  outrage 
in  Dorset  Court,"  says  his  indignant  father,  "  yet  he 
committed  it,  and  was  last  night  hurried  before  the 


224  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Lord  Chief  Justice  for  it."  Well,  here  is  still  Dorset 
Street,  the  successor  of  Dorset  Court,  a  little  east  of 
Whitefriars  Street,  mounting  into  Salisbury  Square. 
All  through  the  comedy,  this  elder  son  is  playing  into 
the  hands  of  the  bullies  of  Alsatia,  swaggering  "  in 
and  about  Whitefriars  with  Cheatly,  and  that  gang 
of  rogues  ;  "  he  lodges  among  them  ;  revels  and  dices 
and  squanders  his  money  with  them  at  the  villainous 
George  Tavern  ;  and  when  his  younger  brother  comes 
into  the  place  to  reason  with  him,  he  excuses  himself 
for  not  having  called  on  his  family  sooner  by  saying 
he  would  not  disgrace  them  by  coming  before  his 
new  equipage  was  ready,  but  he  has  it  now  and  in- 
tended visiting  them  to-morrow,  and  incontinently 
asks  his  valet  :  "Is  my  coach  at  the  gate  next  to  the 
Green  Dragon  ?  "  And  I  like  to  assume  that  the 
Green  Dragon  just  round  the  corner  in  Fleet  Street, 
is  the  lineal  descendant  of  the  one  he  referred  to.  It 
was  in  the  George  that  Sir  William  Belfond  ran  his 
erring  son  to  earth  :  "  As  I  told  you,"  he  says  to  his 
brother,  Sir  Edward,  "  when  I  found  that  the  rogue 
was  with  his  wicked  associates  at  the  George,  in 
Whitefriars  ;  when  they  saw  I  was  resolved  to  see  my 
son,  and  was  rough  with  'em,  Cheatly  and  his  rogues 
set  up  a  cry  against  me,  '  An  arrest  !  A  bailiff  !  an 
arrest  ! '  The  mobile,  and  all  the  rakehells  in  the 
house  and  there  about  the  street  assembled  :  I  ran, 
and  they  had  a  fair  course  after  me  into  Fleet  Street. 
Thanks  to  the  vigor  I  have  left,  my  heels  saved  my 
life  !  "  He  goes  again,  this  time  with  a  Tipstaff,  the 
constable  and  his  watchmen ;  and  "  the  posse  of  the 
Friars  "  draw  up  to  oppose  him,  and  "  cry  out  '  An 
arrest !  '     Several   flock   to   them   with   all   sorts    of 


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Chisi/v/ck  AUll 

FtedyttJcock  ■ 

On  the  Mall,  hy  the  Thames,  stands  WalpMe  House,  which  is  Miss  rinkertons 
Academv.  in  '  I  'anity  Fair.' '  _ . 


Chafiter  it 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE    225 

weapons  ;  women  with  fire-forks,  spits,  faring-shovels, 
&c."  The  rabble  beat  the  constable,  his  men  bolt 
and  escape  from  Alsatia  through  one  of  the  gates  into 
the  Temple,  and  Sir  William  is  captured,  but  his 
younger  son  comes  in  time  to  his  rescue  through  the 
same  gateway,  with  "  several  gentlemen.  Porter  of 
the  Temple,  and  Belfond's  footmen."  The  tables  are 
turned,  the  mob  beaten  off,  and  Cheatly,  Shamwell 
and  Hackum  carried  prisoners  into  the  Temple,  the 
Porter  being  ordered  to  "  shut  the  gates  into  White- 
friars,"  when  they  are  through.  Possibly  that  gate 
was  the  one  at  the  end  of  Tudor  Street,  which  opens 
into  King's  Bench  Walk.  All  through  the  play  there 
is  rascality,  revelry  and  rioting  going  on  in  White- 
friars  Street  and  the  tangled  maze  of  slums,  courts 
and  alleys  that  lie  about  it,  the  sound  of  a  horn  in 
the  street  calling  the  reckless  outlaws  together  when- 
ever any  one  of  their  number  is  threatened  with  arrest, 
or  the  sheriffs  invade  the  quarter  in  search  of  one  who 
has  no  right  of  sanctuary. 

Shadwell  gives  you  a  more  intimate  and  vivid 
picture  of  this  Alsatia  than  you  get  even  from  Scott's 
Fortunes  of  Nigel.  When  Nigel  incurred  the  dis- 
pleasure of  the  King  by  his  affray  with  Lord  Dalgarno 
near  the  Palace,  in  St.  James's  Park,  and  the  officers 
were  in  pursuit  of  him,  he  sought  temporary  seclusion 
in  Whitefriars.  The  residents  in  the  Temple  them- 
selves occasionally  fled  for  safety  into  Alsatia,  when 
they  were  in  debt  and  the  bailiffs  after  them,  and  one 
of  these  residents,  Master  Lowcstoffc,  befriended 
Nigel,  took  him  to  his  chambers,  lent  him  a  shabbier 
suit,  to  avoid  suspicion,  and  conducted  him  into 
Whitefriars  by  one  of  the  Temple  gates,— and  he,  too, 


226  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

had  his  adventures  at  the  infamous  George  tavern, 
and  in  these  sly  alleys  and  byways,  but  I  shall  quote 
no  more  than  Scott's  strongly  realised  vision  of  what 
Nigel  saw  on  his  first  coming  in  : 

"  The  ancient  Sanctuary  at  Whitefriars  lay  considerably 
lower  than  the  elevated  terraces  and  gardens  of  the  Temple, 
and  was  therefore  generally  involved  in  the  damps  and  fogs 
arising  from  the  Thames.  The  brick  buildings,  by  which 
it  was  occupied,  crowded  closely  on  each  other,  for,  in  a  place 
so  rarely  privileged,  every  foot  of  ground  was  valuable  ;  but 
erected  in  many  cases  by  persons  whose  funds  were  inadequate 
to  their  speculations,  the  houses  were  generally  insufficient, 
and  exhibited  the  lamentable  signs  of  having  become  ruinous 
while  they  were  yet  new.  The  wailing  of  children,  the  scolding 
of  their  mothers,  the  miserable  exhibition  of  ragged  linens 
hung  from  the  windows  to  dry,  spoke  the  wants  and  distresses 
of  the  wretched  inhabitants  ;  while  the  sounds  of  complaint 
were  mocked  and  overwhelmed  in  the  riotous  shouts,  oaths, 
and  profane  songs  and  boisterous  laughter  that  issued  from  the 
alehouses  and  taverns  which,  as  the  signs  indicated,  were 
equal  in  number  to  all  the  other  houses  ;  and,  that  the  full 
character  of  the  place  might  be  evident,  several  faded,  tinselled 
and  painted  females  looked  boldly  at  the  strangers  from  their 
open  lattices,  or  more  modestly  seemed  busied  with  the  cracked 
flower-pots,  filled  with  mignonette  and  rosemary,  which  were 
disposed  in  front  of  the  windows  to  the  great  risk  of  the 
passengers." 

If  you  wander  about  Whitefriars  Street,  Dorset 
Street,  Salisbury  Square  (in  which  Shadwell  and, 
later,  Samuel  Richardson  lived).  Magpie  Alley,  Primrose 
Hill,  Wilderness  Lane,  Temple  Lane,  and,  especially, 
Hanging-Sword  Alley,  you  may  realise  something  of 
the  geography  and  atmosphere  of  that  squalidly 
romantic  Alsatia.  You  approach  Magpie  Alley  and 
Hanging-Sword  Alley  by  flights  of  steps,  but  those  into 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE  227 

Hanging-Sword  Alley  are  the  narrower,  steeper  and 
higher  ;  at  the  foot  of  them  is  an  ancient  tavern.  The 
Harrow,  which  has  a  fascinatingly  brooding  and  mys- 
terious-looking back  window  and  door  round  the  corner 
on  Primrose  Hill  ;  and  the  Alley  itself,  at  the  top  of 
the  steps,  is  long,  dim,  very  narrow  and  uneven,  and 
still  wears  much  such  a  secret,  shabbily  rakish  air  as 
it  must  have  worn  w^hen  the  bullies  and  outlaws  of 
Alsatia  lounged  and  gossiped,  wTangled  and  duelled 
in  it,  or  tore  pell-mell  along  it  and  down  the  steps, 
at  the  sound  of  the  horn,  to  join  their  motley  comrades 
in  repelling  some  invasion  of  the  sheriffs.  WTiy  Scott 
made  no  use  of  this,  the  most  bizarre  of  Alsatian 
remains,  I  do  not  know  ;  Ainsworth  introduces  it 
into  one  of  his  highly-coloured  romances  of  the  long 
past  ;  but,  better  than  that,  Dickens  brings  it  into 
his  early  nineteenth  century  story,  A  Tale  of  Two 
Cities.  Jerry  Cnmcher,  the  odd  job  man  and  occa- 
sional porter  who  used  to  stand  outside  Tellson's 
Bank,  which  was  just  within  Temple  Bar  in  Fleet 
Street,  had  "  private  lodgings  in  Hanging-Sword  Alley, 
Whitefriars.  .  .  .  Mr.  Clincher's  apartments  were 
not  in  a  savoury  neighbourhood,  and  WTrc  but  two 
in  number,  even  if  a  closet  with  a  single  pane  of  glass 
in  it  might  be  counted  as  one."  The  Alley  is  largely 
a  place  of  back  windows,  but  along  one  side  is  a  rather 
high,  blind  wall  with  dark  little  doors  in  it,  and  you 
may  depend  that  one  of  these  few  doors  was  Jerry's, 
and  he  went  in  by  it  to  those  apartments  in  which  he 
was  continually  protesting  against  Mrs.  Cruncher's 
habit  of  "  Hopping  "  in  pray(  r  for  him,  because  she 
could  not  reconcile  herself  to  his  unholy  business  of 
body-snatching.     In  one  of  his  two  apartments  Mr. 


228  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Cruncher  sat  up  one  night  preparing  for  one  of  these 
excursions  to  a  churchyard  ;  he  sat  smoking  until 
one  o'clock,  which  was  his  time  for  starting.  "  Towards 
that  small  and  ghostly  hour,  he  rose  up  from  his  chair, 
took  a  key  from  his  pocket,  opened  a  locked  cupboard, 
and  brought  forth  a  sack,  a  crowbar  of  convenient 
size,  a  rope  and  chain,  and  other  fishing  tackle  of  that 
nature.  Disposing  these  articles  about  him  in  skilful 
manner,  he  bestowed  a  parting  glance  of  defiance  on 
Mrs.  Cruncher,  extinguished  the  light  and  went  out." 
Young  Jerry,  his  son,  curious  as  to  the  object  of  these 
midnight  outings,  had  only  made  a  feint  of  undressing 
when  he  went  to  bed  ;  now,  "  under  cover  of  the 
darkness  he  followed  out  of  the  room,  followed  down 
the  stairs,  followed  down  the  court,  followed  out  into 
the  streets."  As  Mr.  Cruncher  went  northwards,  you 
may  take  it  they  did  not  go  down  the  steps  at  the 
lower  end  of  the  alley,  but  flitted  up  it,  under  the  part 
that  is  arched  over  by  business  premises,  and  round 
the  bend  to  where  it  opens  on  the  higher  level  of 
W^itefriars  Street.  Mr.  George,  in  Bleak  House, 
coming  from  his  shooting-gallery  near  Leicester 
Square,  walked  down  the  Strand,  through  "  the 
cloisterly  Temple,  and  by  Whitefriars  (there,  not 
without  a  glance  at  Hanging-Sword  Alley,  which 
would  seem  to  be  something  in  his  way),  by  Black- 
friars  Bridge  and  Blackfriars  Road,"  to  the  shop  now 
kept  by  that  other  old  soldier,  Matthew  Bagnet,  in 
the  neighbourhood  of  the  Elephant  and  Castle. 

Tellson's  Bank  was  another  name  for  Child's  Bank, 
which  has  been  rebuilt  on  the  same  spot  since  Temple 
Bar  was  demolished.  Jerry  sat  waiting  for  custom 
outside  it  on  a  stool ;   he  was  sitting  there  when  the 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE    229 

funeral  procession  of  Roger  Cly,  the  Old  Bailey  spy, 
came  up  Fleet  Street  ;  young  Jerry  was  with  him  and 
stood  on  the  stool  to  see  the  sight,  but  old  Jerry  joined 
the  disorderly  mob  that  after  commencing  to  drag 
the  coffin  out  of  the  hearse,  altered  its  mind,  swarmed 
into  the  mourning-coaches,  and  joyously  and  up- 
roariously added  itself  to  the  procession. 

Opposite  Childs',  a  branch  of  the  Bank  of  England 
occupies  the  site  of  the  Cock  Tavern  ;  Pepys  once 
took  Mrs.  Knipp,  the  actress  to  it,  but  it  is  better  re- 
membered as  a  favourite  haunt  of  Tennyson's,  who 
addressed  his  Will  Waterproof's  Monologue  to  the 

plump  head-waiter  at  the  Cock 
To  which  I  most  resort. 

That  side,  between  the  Cock  and  Chancery  Lane, 
stood  the  house  of  Izaak  Walton.  But  we  have  come 
too  far  up  the  street  and  must  go  back  to  St. 
Dunstan's  Church,  not  because  Dr.  Donne  used  to 
preach  in  its  predecessor,  but  because  on  the  pave- 
ment outside  that  predecessor  Trotty  Veck,  of  The 
Chimes,  used  to  stand,  as  a  ticket  porter,  waiting  for 
people  to  engage  him  ;  and  because  David  Ramsay, 
maker  of  watches  and  horologues  to  his  Majesty 
James  L,  as  you  will  know  if  you  have  read  The 
Fortunes  of  Nigel,  used  to  "  keep  opcji  shop  within 
Temple  Bar,  a  few  yards  to  the  eastward  of  Saint 
Dunstan's  Church  : 

"  The  shop  of  a  London  tradesman  of  that  time,  as  it  may 
be  supposed,  was  something  very  diflerent  from  those  we  now 
see  in  the  same  locality.  The  goods  were  exposed  for  sale  in 
cases,  only  defended  from  the  weather  by  a  covering  of  canvas, 
and  the  whole  resembled  the  stalls  and  booths  now  erected 


230  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

for  the  temporary  accommodation  of  dealers  at  a  country  fair^ 
rather  than  the  estabhshed  emporium  of  a  respectable  citizen. 
But  most  of  the  shopkeepers  of  note,  and  David  Ramsay  among 
them,  had  their  booth  connected  with  a  small  apartment  which 
opened  backward  from  it,  and  bore  the  same  resemblance  to 
the  front  shop  that  Robinson  Crusoe's  cavern  did  to  the  tent 
which  he  erected  before  it.  To  this  Master  Ramsay  was  often 
accustomed  to  retreat  to  the  labour  of  his  abstruse  calculations  ; 
for  he  aimed  at  improvement  and  discoveries  in  his  own  art, 
and  sometimes  pushed  his  researches,  like  Napier  and  other 
mathematicians  of  the  period,  into  abstract  science.  When 
thus  engaged,  he  left  the  outer  posts  of  his  commercial  establish- 
ment to  be  maintained  by  two  stout-bodied  and  strong-voiced 
apprentices,  who  kept  up  the  cry  of  '  What  d'ye  lack  ?  what 
d'ye  lack  ?  '  accompanied  with  the  appropriate  recommendations 
of  the  articles  in  which  they  dealt." 

When  Kate,  in  Webster's  Northward  Ho !  asks 
Featherstone,  "  Doth  my  husband  do  any  things 
about  London  ?  doth  he  swagger  ?  "  he  assures  her 
that  her  husband  is  "  as  tame  as  a  fray  in  Fleet  Street 
when  there  are  nobody  to  part  them  ;  "  and  you  may 
gather  some  notion  of  what  this  means  from  Scott's 
pictures  of  the  wild  fights  between  the  'prentices 
and  the  Templars  or  the  citizens,  in  which  combats 
David  Ramsay's  two  'prentices  took  their  fair  share. 
There  was  traffic  between  Ramsay's  pretty  daughter 
Margaret  and  Mistress  Suddlechops,  wife  of  the  noted 
barber  whose  shop  was  also  in  Fleet  Street,  and  to 
Ramsay's  premises  by  St.  Dunstan's  came  Nigel, 
Master  Heriot,  and  many  another  who  had  to  do 
with  Nigel's  varying  fortunes. 

Across  the  road  again,  a  little  beyond  the  Middle 
Temple  gateway,  stood  the  Devil  Tavern  where  Ben 
Jonson's  famous  club  held  its  meetings  in  the  Apollo 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE  231 

room  ;  he  lays  a  scene  of  his  Staple  of  News  in  the 
same  room  of  that  tavern  ;  and,  to  say  nothing  of 
many  a  more  and  less  glorious  happening  there,  it 
was  in  the  Apollo  room  that  Randolph  was  first 
introduced  to  his  Master  and,  "  sworn  of  the  tribe 
of  Ben,"  went  away  to  write  "  A  gratulatory  to  Master 
Ben  Jonson,  for  his  adopting  of  him  to  be  his  son." 

.  .  .  And  to  say  truth,  that  which  is  best  in  me 
May  call  you  father  ;  'twas  begot  by  thee. 
Have  I  a  spark  of  that  celestial  flame 
Within  me  ?     I  confess  I  stole  the  same, 
Prometheus-like,  from  thee  ;  and  may  I  feed 
His  vulture  when  I  dare  deny  the  deed. 
Many  more  moons  thou  hast,  that  shine  by  night, 
All  bankrupts,  were't  not  for  a  borrowed  light, 
Yet  can  forswear  it ;  I  the  debt  confess, 
And  think  my  reputation  none  the  less. 

I  will  sooner  forgive  the  removal  of  Temple  Bar  than 
the  ruthless  sweeping  away  of  a  place  so  sacred  as  the 
Devil  Tavern  ;  it  ought  never  to  have  been  pulled 
down  ;  and  it  is  a  poor  consolation  to  know  that  the 
black  board  on  which  the  rules  of  Jonson's  club  are 
inscribed,  and  the  bust  of  Apollo  that  stood  over  the 
door  of  his  room  and  gave  it  its  name  are  still  pre- 
served in  Child's  Bank. 

Eugene  Wrayburn,  of  Our  Mutual  Friend,  shared 
chambers  in  Goldsmith  Buildings  with  Mortimer 
Lightwood.  Goldsmith  Buildings  are  in  the  Temple 
and  arc  entered  from  Fleet  Street  through  an  archway 
that  faces  Chancery  Lane,  and  coming  out  by  that 
archway  one  day,  after  an  interview  with  the  two 
lawyers,  Mr.  Boffin  was  jogging  along  Fleet  Street 
when   John   Rokesmith   overtook   him,   admitted  he 


232  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

had  been  following  him,  and  asked,  "  Would  you 
object  to  turn  aside  into  this  place — I  think  it  is  called 
Clifford's  Inn — where  we  can  hear  one  another  better 
than  in  the  roaring  street  ?  "  And  they  walked  up 
the  passage  against  St.  Dunstan's  under  the  arch  into 
the  Inn,  and  as  Mr.  Boffin  listened  to  Rokesmith's 
appeal  for  employment  as  his  secretary,  Mr.  Boffin 
"  glanced  into  the  mouldy  little  plantation,  or  cat 
preserve,  of  Clifford's  Inn,  as  it  was  that  day,  in 
search  of  a  suggestion.  Sparrows  were  there,  cats 
were  there,  dry-rot  and  wet-rot  were  there,  but  it  was 
not  otherwise  a  suggestive  spot." 

On  the  terrace,  across  the  other  side  of  this  railed-in 
plantation  in  the  middle  of  Clifford's  Inn,  stood  those 
old  Judges'  Chambers  to  which  Mr.  Perker  came 
with  Mr.  Pickwick  and  Sam  Weller,  to  conduct  cer- 
tain proceedings  in  connection  with  Mr.  Pickwick's 
transfer  to  the  Fleet  Prison,  but  they  approached  it 
by  an  arched  entrance  from  Chancery  Lane,  and  this 
entrance  and  the  Judges'  Chambers  themselves  are 
all  gone,  though  they  were  here  within  my  own 
memory. 

All  Chancery  Lane  is  strongly  reminiscent  of  Bleak 
House.  Here  it  is,  at  the  opening  of  the  story,  that 
on  a  densely  foggy  day,  "  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Hall,  at 
the  very  heart  of  the  fog,  sits  the  Lord  High  Chan- 
cellor in  his  High  Court  of  Chancery  ;  "  and  if  you  go 
in  by  the  old-world  gateway  out  of  Chancery  Lane, 
across  Old  Square,  which  is  very  old,  there  still  is 
Lincoln's  Inn  Hall,  no  longer  used  as  a  Law  Court. 
To  Lincoln's  Inn  Hall  again  and  again  came  all  those 
harassed  suitors  concerned  in  the  notorious  cause  of 
"  Jamdyce  v.  Jarndyce  ;  "   Kenge  and  Carboy,  Mr. 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE     233 

Jamdyce's  solicitors,  had  their  offices  in  Old  Square, 
and  to  their  offices  went  Esther  Summerson  to  be 
engaged  as  companion  to  Ada  Clare,  John  Jarndyce's 
ward.  She  met  Richard  Carstone  and  Ada  there, 
and  they  all  went  over  into  the  Hall  with  Mr.  Kenge 
to  arrange  with  the  Lord  Chancellor  about  Esther's 
appointment.  Afterwards,  as  Esther,  with  Ada  and 
Richard  hesitated  under  the  colonnade  of  the  Hall, 
poor  little  Miss  Flyte,  "  a  curious  little  old  woman  in 
a  squeezed  bonnet,  and  carrying  a  reticule,  camiC 
curtsejang  and  smiling  up  to  us,  with  an  air  of  great 
ceremony,"  to  have  the  honour  of  knowing  "  the 
wards  in  Jarndyce,"  she  herself  being  involved  in 
endless  Chancery  proceedings  that  had  unbalanced 
her  mind  ;  and  she  accompanied  them  across  Old 
Square  to  the  foot  of  the  broad,  steep  flight  of  stairs 
that  led  up  into  Kenge  and  Carboy's  offices.  "  We 
passed  into  sudden  quietude  under  an  old  gateway," 
so  Esther  describes  her  first  arrival  here,  in  a  cab 
along  Chancery  Lane,  "  and  drove  on  through  a  silent 
square  until  we  came  to  an  odd  nook  in  a  corner,  where 
there  was  an  entrance  up  a  steep,  broad  flight  of  stairs, 
like  an  entrance  to  a  church.  And  there  really  was  a 
churchyard,  outside  under  some  cloisters,  for  I  saw 
the  gravestones  from  the  staircase  window."  Stand 
in  those  cloisters  now  and  you  can  look  across  at 
Kenge  and  Carboy's  offices.  Mr.  Guppy  and  young 
Smallwced  were  clerks  in  the  office,  and  on  a  hot  day 
in  vacation-time,  taking  a  breath  of  air  at  the  window, 
"  looking  out  into  the  shade  of  Old  Square,  sur- 
veying the  intolerable  brick  and  mortar,  Mr.  Guppy 
becomes  conscious  of  a  manly  whisker  emerging  from 
the  cloistered  walk  below  and  turning  itself  up  in  the 


234  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

direction  of  his  face  ;  "  the  owner  of  the  whisker 
proves  to  be  his  friend  Mr.  JobHng,  who  stands  under 
the  window  and  induces  Mr.  Guppy  to  throw  him 
down  the  loan  of  half  a  crown. 

Through  the  cloisters,  and  you  come  out  into  Stone 
Buildings,  where  Mr.  Wharton,  the  barrister,  in 
Trollope's  Prime  Minister,  had  his  chambers.  Stone 
Buildings  is  formed  by  two  tall  rows  and  an  end  wall 
of  drab  stone  houses,  with  steps  to  their  front  door- 
ways and  wide,  railed-in  areas  before  their  basements. 
Those  on  the  right  back  upon  Chancery  Lane  ;  Mr. 
Wharton's  chambers  must  have  been  on  the  left,  and 
at  the  back,  for  "  he  had  a  large,  pleasant  room  in 
which  to  sit,  looking  out  from  the  ground  floor  of 
Stone  Buildings  on  to  the  gardens  belonging  to  the 
Inn."  High  up  in  Stone  Buildings,  on  the  left,  and 
at  the  back  too,  lived  Raymond  Pennicuick,  of 
James  Payn's  By  Proxy,  for  he  had  a  window  "  look- 
ing down  on  the  green."  If  instead  of  going  out  to 
Stone  Buildings,  you  pass  from  Old  Square  by  Lin- 
coln's Inn  Hall,  across  New  Square  (where  in  his  boy- 
hood Dickens  was  employed  as  a  lawyer's  clerk),  you 
emerge  upon  the  broad  open  space  of  Lincoln's  Inn 
Fields.  Here,  in  the  opening  scene  of  Farquhar's 
Love  and  a  Bottle,  the  wild,  roving  Roebuck  meets 
with  the  wealthy  young  Lucinda  and  her  maid,  and 
after  some  flippant  converse,  suddenly  kisses  Lucinda 
and  catching  her  up  is  carrying  her  off  when,  to  her 
cries  for  help,  Lovewell  and  his  man  dash  in,  and  he 
and  Roebuck  have  drawn  their  swords  and  are  on 
the  verge  of  fighting  a  duel,  but  recognise  each  other 
as  old  friends  and  embrace  instead.  Again,  in  Sir 
Harry  Wildair  Farquhar  has  a  scene  in  Lincoln's  Inn 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE    235 

Fields,  where  Sir  Harry  is  fighting  a  ludicrous  duel 
with  Monsieur  the  Marquis,  when  Colonel  Standard 
and  Captain  Fireball  arrive  and  part  them.  Doctor 
Hellebore,  in  Foote's  play.  The  Cozeners,  lives  at 
"  the  third  door  to  the  left  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields  ;  " 
at  No.  55,  lived  Tennyson  ;  and  at  No.  58,  John 
Forster,  whose  house  and  chambers  Dickens  described 
as  those  of  Mr.  Tulkinghorn,  in  Bleak  House  :  "  Here, 
in  a  large  house,  formerly  a  house  of  state,  lives  Mr. 
Tulkinghorn.  It  is  let  off  in  sets  of  chambers  now  ; 
and  in  those  shrunken  fragments  of  its  greatness, 
lawyers  lie  like  maggots  in  nuts."  Mr.  Tulkinghorn 
enters  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields  one  evening,  from  Chesney 
Wold,  whilst  the  lamplighter  is  lighting  the  lamps, 
and  "  arrives  at  his  own  dull  courtyard.  He  ascends 
the  doorsteps  and  is  gliding  into  the  dusky  hall,  when 
he  encounters,  on  the  top  step,  a  bowing  and  pro- 
pitiatory little  man."  This  is  Mr.  Snagsby,  the  law 
stationer,  of  Took's  Court  ;  talking  with  whom,  Mr. 
Tulkinghorn  "  leans  his  arms  on  the  iron  railing  at 
the  top  of  the  steps,  and  looks  at  the  lamplighter 
lighting  the  courtyard."  By  and  by,  in  his  room 
upstairs,  Mr.  Tulkinghorn  is  to  be  murdered  ;  but 
this  house's  greater  interest,  after  all,  is  that  to  it 
came  Forster's  friends,  who  included  most  of  the  men 
great  in  art  and  letters  of  his  day  ;  and  in  his  room 
here  on  the  2nd  December,  1844,  Carlylc,  Douglas 
Jerrold,  MacHse,  Forster,  and  others  gathered  to  hear 
Dickens  read  The  Chimes  before  it  was  published. 

Polly  Sparkes  of  Gissing's  Towfi  Traveller,  once 
came  to  keep  an  appoint meiit  with  a  mysterious 
correspondent  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  and  waited  for 
him  in  vain  "  on  the  quiet  pavement  shadowed  by 


236  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

the  College  of  Surgeons  ;  "  Mr.  Wharton  and  Fletcher, 
in  The  Prime  Minister,  dined  in  Portugal  Street, 
Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  at  "  a  very  quaint  old-fashioned 
dining-house  ;  "  and  I  suspect  that  this  was  the  same 
"  quiet  house  of  refreshment  in  the  vicinity  of  Lincoln's 
Inn  Fields "  to  which  Joseph  Snowden  and  Mr. 
Scawthorne,  in  Gissing's  Nether  World,  came  when 
they  were  plotting  together  against  Joseph's  father. 
On  the  western  side  of  the  Fields,  in  Portsmouth 
Street,  is  the  quaint  old  shop  that  confidently  pro- 
claims itself  as  Dickens's  original  "  Old  Curiosity 
Shop,"  but  it  does  not  answer  to  the  description  of 
the  shop  in  the  book,  so  you  may  believe  it  or  not, 
as  you  choose. 

Between  the  old  Lincoln's  Inn  gateway  and  Carey 
Street,  out  of  Chancery  Lane,  is  Bishop's  Court,  one 
of  those  odd,  attenuated  byways  that  old  London 
loved  ;  and  at  the  top  of  Bishops'  Court,  a  door  or 
two  round  the  bend  of  it  and  facing  the  wall  of 
Lincoln's  Inn,  was  Krook's  Rag  and  Bottle  shop. 
Richard  Carstone,  Ada,  and  Esther  Summerson  went 
there  with  little  Miss  Flyte,  who  lived  over  it,  and 
they  lingered  outside  examining  the  amazing  litter 
of  rubbish  heaped  in  the  window  : 

"As  it  was  still  foggy  and  dark,  and  as  the  shop 
was  blinded  besides  by  the  wall  of  Lincoln's  Inn, 
intercepting  the  light  within  a  couple  of  yards,  we 
should  not  have  seen  so  much  but  for  a  lighted  lantern 
that  an  old  man  in  spectacles  and  a  hairy  cap  was 
carrying  about  in  the  shop."  Miss  Flyte  "lived  at 
the  top  of  the  house  in  a  pretty  large  room,  from  which 
she  had  a  glimpse  of  the  roof  of  Lincoln's  Inn  Hall." 
A  lodger  on  a  lower  floor  was  the  mysterious,  im- 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE  237 

pecunious  law-writer  known  as  "  Nemo  ;  "  he  died 
there,  and  an  inquest  was  held  upon  him  at  a  tavern 
a  few  doors  away  ;  but  the  tavern  vanished  from  the 
top  corner  of  Chichester  Rents  a  short  time  ago.  The 
newspaper  reports  of  this  inquest  led  Lady  Dedlock 
to  finding  Poor  Jo,  who  had  been  one  of  the  witnesses, 
at  his  crossing,  and  paying  him  to  take  her  round  to 
all  the  places  "  Nemo  "  had  been  connected  with  :  to 
Mr.  Snagsby's,  in  Took's  Court,  Cursitor  Street  ;  to 
Krook's  shop  ;  and  to  that  dreadful  old  graveyard 
in  the  neighbourhood  of  Drury  Lane  where  the  dead 
man  was  buried. 

Cursitor  Street  is  on  the  other  side  of  Chancery 
Lane,  nearer  to  Holborn,  and  you  may  still  see  Took's 
Court  in  it  (which  Dickens  thinly  disguises  as  Cook's 
Court),  and  there  arc  three  or  four  dingily  respectable 
old  Georgian  houses  near  the  Cursitor  Street  end  of 
it,  one  of  which  was  certainly  the  house  in  which  Mr. 
Snagsby,  the  law  stationer,  carried  on  his  business, 
and  was  visited  by  Mr.  Chadband. 

Out  of  Carey  Street,  Bell  Yard  slopes  down  into 
Fleet  Street  again,  and  it  was  to  an  attic  over  a 
chandler's  shop  in  Bell  Yard  that  Esther  Summerson 
went  with  Mr.  Jamdycc  and  Harold  Skimpolc  to  see 
the  Coavines  children.  The  lower  end  of  the  Yard 
flows  into  Fleet  Street  at  the  point  where  it  joins  the 
Strand,  and  where  Temple  Bar  stood  in  the  days  of 
David  Coppcrfield,  who  came  down  the  Strand  with 
Mr.  Peggotty,  "  through  Temple  Bar,  into  the  City," 
when  they  were  looking  for  the  outcast  Martha  in 
the  hope  that  she  could  give  them  news  about  the 
lost  Little  Em'ly  ;  and  in  the  days  when  Kawdon 
Crawley,  of  Vanity  lair,  was  arrested  for  debt,  and 


238  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  finished  his  cigar  as  the  cab  drove  under  Temple 
Bar,"  carrying  him  to  the  sponging  house  of  Mr.  Moss, 
which  was  in  Cursitor  Street,  Chancery  Lane  ;  where 
also  was  the  sponging  house  with  which  Coavines 
(otherwise  Neckett)  of  Bell  Yard  was  connected. 

We  won't  go  into  the  Temple  by  the  Middle  Temple 
Lane  archway,  but  by  the  more  eastern  arch  which 
gives   on   Goldsmith   Buildings  where,   once  upon   a 
time,  the  reader  of  Our  Mutual  Friend  might,  like 
Mr.    Boffin,   have   found  the  chambers   of  Mortimer 
Lightfoot  and  Eugene  Wrayburn,  if  he  had  "  wandered 
disconsolately  about  the  Temple  until  he  stumbled 
on  a  dismal  churchyard,  and  had  looked  up  at  the 
dismal  windows  commanding  that  churchyard  until 
at  the  most  dismal  window  of  them  all  he  saw  a  dismal 
boy  " — the  window  being  on  the  second  floor,  and  the 
boy  Lightfoot's  only  clerk.     The  churchyard,  in  which 
Goldsmith  was  buried,  is  that  of  the  Temple  Church, 
at  which  Captain  Face,  in  Ben  Jonson's  Alchemist, 
desired   Surly,   the  gambler,    to  meet  him ;    and   to 
which    Pendennis    and    Clive     Newcome    went     one 
Sunday  with  Rosey  to  see  the  tombs  of  the  Knights 
Templars.      Immediately  past  the  Church   is    Lamb 
Court ;  and  in  Lamb  Building  Pendennis  had  chambers 
on  the  third  floor.     Major  Pendennis  sent  his  man 
Morgan  there  with  a  note  for  Pendennis,  and  when  he 
returned,  the  Major  asked  from  behind  his  bed-curtains 
in  his  lodging  in  Bury  Street,  St.  James's,  "  What  sort 
of  a  place  is  it,  Morgan  ?  "    "I  should  say  rayther  a  shy 
place,"  said  Mr.  Morgan.     "  The  lawyers  lives  there, 
and  has  their  names  on  the  doors.     Mr.  Harthur  lives 
three  pair  high,  sir.     Mr.  Warrington  lives  there  too, 
sir.    .    .    .    Honly  saw  the  outside  of  the  door,  sir. 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE     239 

with  Mr.  Warrington's  name  and  Mr.  Arthur's  painted 
up,  and  a  piece  of  paper  with  '  Back  at  6  ;  '  but  I 
couldn't  see  no  servant,  sir."  "  Economical  at  any 
rate,"  said  the  Major.  "  Very,  sir.  Three  pair,  sir. 
Nasty  black  staircase  as  ever  I  see."  At  different 
times,  the  old  Major,  Captain  Costigan,  and  Harry 
Foker  climbed  these  stairs  to  see  them.  One  evening, 
after  Pendennis  had  resolved  that  he  must  break  off 
his  friendship  with  little  Fanny  Bolton,  daughter  of 
the  gatekeeper  of  Shepherd's  Inn  (which  was  really 
Clement's  Inn),  he  happened  to  meet  Fanny  and  her 
two  small  sisters  with  their  mother  in  Temple  Gardens  ; 
it  was  a  slightly  agitated  meeting,  and  he  presently 
left  them  there  and  returned  home.  "  When  the 
gardens  were  closed,  the  two  women,  who  had  had 
but  a  melancholy  evening's  amusement,  walked  sadly 
away  with  the  children,  and  they  entered  into  Lamb 
Court  and  stood  under  the  lamp-post  which  cheerfully 
ornaments  the  centre  of  that  quadrangle,  and  looked 
up  to  the  third  floor  of  the  house  where  Pendennis 's 
chambers  were,  and  where  they  saw  a  light  presently 
kindled.  Then  these  couple  of  fools  went  away,  the 
children  dragging  wearily  after  them."  When  Pen- 
dennis was  laid  up  dangerously  ill  there,  Fanny  gained 
admission  and  remained  to  nurse  him,  until  his  mother 
and  Laura,  the  cousin  who  loved  him,  came  from  the 
country,  ousted  the  tearful  little  nurse  resentfully, 
and  shared  her  duties  between  them.  Thereafter, 
when  he  was  convalescent,  they  had  music  and  singing 
up  there  in  his  room  or  the  rooms  of  a  friend  on  the 
floor  below,  and  "  I  wonder  how  that  poor  pale  little 
girl  in  the  black  bonnet,  who  used  to  stand  at  the 
lamp-post  in  Lamb  Court  sometimes  of  an  evening, 


240  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

looking  up  at  the  open  windows  from  which  the  music 
came,  liked  to  hear  it  ?  ...  At  last,  after  about  ten 
days  of  this  life,  one  evening  when  the  little  spy  of 
the  court  came  out  to  take  her  usual  post  of  observa- 
tion at  the  lamp,  there  was  no  music  from  the  second- 
floor  window,  there  were  no  lights  in  the  third  story 
chambers,  the  windows  of  each  were  open,  and  the 
occupants  were  gone.  Mrs.  Flanagan,  the  laundress, 
told  Fanny  what  had  happened.  The  ladies  and  all 
the  party  had  gone  to  Richmond  for  change  of  air." 

South  of  Lamb  Building,  down  the  steps  and  under 
the  Temple  Library,  and  you  are  out,  with,  on  your 
right,  Crown  Office  Row,  where  Lamb  was  born,  the 
Temple  Gardens  facing  you,  and  on  your  left  King's 
Bench  Walk,  and,  nearer.  Paper  Buildings,  where 
Sydney  Carton  used  to  work,  in  the  chambers  of  Mr. 
Stryver ;  and  in  Paper  Buildings  lived  Sir  John 
Chester,  of  Barnaby  Rudge,  and  breakfasted  in  bed 
one  morning,  able  to  see  "  through  the  half  opened 
window,  the  Temple  Garden,"  and  the  dome  of  St. 
Paul's  ;  for  Temple  Garden  stretches  all  along  beside 
and  behind  Paper  Buildings.  Shakespeare,  with 
warrant  from  history,  places  a  scene  of  Henry  VI.  in 
the  Temple  Garden,  and  brings  the  partizans  of  York 
and  Lancaster  into  it  to  continue  a  dispute  as  to 
the  right  of  succession  that  had  begun  between  them 
in  the  Temple  Hall  : 

Plantagenet.  Great  lords  and  gentlemen,  what  means  this 
silence  ? 
Dare  no  man  answer  in  a  case  of  truth  ? 

Suffolk.  Within  the  Temple  hall  we  were  too  loud  ; 
The  garden  here  is  more  convenient. 

Plantagenet.  Then  say  at  once  if  I  maintained  the  truth^ 


% 


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;,:.;-:ili-:^^ii^'*^V 


7«f  Jp^Ni^ecii  JiAMPsr.'.i.-}- 
ftedyidcock 

'^  Mrs.  Barticlly  o/  '  I'ickviick,'  vciil  with  Mnslff  liariiell  ami  a  /nifty  i\f  /fifnds  to 
take  the  air  ami  have  rr/reshiiiciit  in  the  pleasant  tea-garden  o/  '  I' he  S/inniards. 

Chnfter  ij 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE    241 

Or  else  was  wrangling  Somerset  in  the  error  ?   .    .    . 
Since  you  are  tongue-tied  and  so  loath  to  speak, 
In  dumb  significants  proclaim  your  thoughts  : 
Let  him  that  is  a  true-born  gentleman 
And  stands  upon  the  honour  of  his  birth, 
If  he  suppose  that  I  have  pleaded  truth, 
From  off  this  brier  pluck  a  white  rose  with  me. 

Somerset.  Let  him  that  is  no  coward  nor  no  flatterer, 
But  dare  maintain  the  party  of  the  truth, 
Pluck  a  red  rose  from  off  this  thorn  with  me. 

Warwick.  I  love  no  colours,  and  without  all  colour 
Of  base  insinuating  flattery, 
I  pluck  this  white  rose  with  Plantagenet 

Suffolk.  I  pluck  this  red  rose  with  young  Somerset, 
And  say  withal  I  think  he  held  the  right.   .  .  . 

Warwick.  ...   I  prophesy,  this  brawl  to-day. 
Grown  to  this  faction  in  the  Temple  Garden, 
Shall  send  between  the  red  rose  and  the  white 
A  thousand  souls  to  death  and  deadly  night. 

"  Fashion  has  long  deserted  the  green  and  pretty  Temple 
Garden,  in  which  Shakespeare  makes  York  and  Lancaster  to 
pluck  the  innocent  white  and  red  roses  which  became  the 
badges  of  their  bloody  wars,"  writes  Thackeray  in  Pendennis. 
"  .  .  .  Only  antiquarians  and  literary  amateurs  care  to 
look  at  the  gardens  with  much  interest,  and  fancy  good  Sir 
Roger  de  Coverley  and  Mr.  Spectator  with  his  short  face  pacing 
up  and  down  the  road  ;  or  dear  Oliver  Goldsmith,  in  the 
summer-house,  perhaps,  meditating  about  the  next  '  Citizen 
of  the  World.'  .  .  .  Treading  heavily  on  the  gravel,  and 
rolling  majestically  along  in  a  snuff-coloured  suit,  and  a  wig 
that  sadly  wants  the  barber's  powder  and  irons,  one  sees  the 
Great  Doctor  step  up  to  him  (his  Scotch  lackey  following  at 
the  lexicographer's  heels,  a  little  the  worse  for  port  wine  that 
they  had  been  taking  at  the  Mitre)  and  Mr.  J(jhnson  asks  Mr. 
Goldsmith  to  come  home  and  take  a  dish  of  tea  with  him. 
Kind  faith  of  Fancy  !  Sir  Roger  and  Mr.  Spectator  are  as 
real  to  us  now  as  the  two  doctors  and  the  boozy  and  faitliful 
i6 


242  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Scotchman.  The  poetical  figures  live  in  our  memory  just 
as  much  as  the  real  personages — and  as  Mr.  Arthur  Pendennis 
was  of  a  romantic  and  literary  turn,  by  no  means  addicted 
to  the  legal  pursuits  common  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the 
place,  we  may  presume  that  he  was  cherishing  some  such 
poetical  reflections  as  these,  when,  upon  the  evening  after  the 
events  recorded  in  the  last  chapter,  the  young  gentleman 
chose  the  Temple  Gardens  as  a  place  for  exercise  and 
meditations." 

And  there  met  Fanny  Bolton,  with  her  sisters  and 
mother,  as  we  have  seen  already.  Both  Goldsmith, 
and,  later,  Thackeray,  lived  at  2  Brick  Court ;  and  at 
the  extreme  western  end  of  the  Garden,  Pip  and 
Herbert  Pocket,  of  Great  Expectations,  shared  chambers 
"  at  the  top  of  the  last  house  "  in  Garden  Court,  and 
thither  and  up  the  dark  staircase  to  those  rooms 
went  Abel  Magwitch,  the  returned  convict,  that  black 
and  rainy  night  when  he  disclosed  the  fact  that  he 
was  Pip's  secret  benefactor,  and  was  hurt  that  the 
disclosure  should  humilitate  Pip  and  horrify  him. 
Up  the  steps  from  Garden  Court,  and  you  are  in 
Fountain  Court,  which  is  close  by  the  beautiful  old 
Hall  of  the  Temple,  in  which  Shakespeare  is  said  to 
have  read  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  to  Queen 
Elizabeth,  at  one  of  the  Benchers'  stately  festivals. 
After  Mr.  Pecksniff  had  discharged  Tom  Pinch,  and 
he  was  cataloguing  books  in  one  of  the  dimmest  courts 
of  the  Temple,  and  residing  out  Islington  way,  with 
his  sister  Ruth  to  keep  house  for  him,  "  there  was  a 
little  plot  between  them  that  Tom  should  always  come 
out  of  the  Temple  by  one  way  ;  and  that  was  past 
the  fountain.  Coming  through  Fountain  Court,  he 
was  just  to  glance  down  the  steps  leading  into  Garden 


FLEET  STREET  AND  THE  TEMPLE     243 

Court,  and  to  look  once  all  round  him  ;  and  if  Ruth 
had  come  to  meet  him,  there  he  would  see  her." 
Once,  as  she  lingered  there,  she  caught  sight  of  John 
Westlock,  and  in  a  panic  of  shyness  ran  off  down  the 
steps,  but  John  followed  and  "  overtook  her  in  the 
sanctuary  of  Garden  Court,"  and  they  waited  untU 
Tom  joined  them,  and  then  all  walked  home  together  ; 
and  you  may  know  they  went  by  Middle  Temple 
Lane,  because  it  is  recorded  that  Tom  made  a  joke, 
and  stopped  under  the  arch  of  Temple  Bar  to  laugh. 
Ruth  and  John  Westlock  came  to  the  Fountain  by 
themselves  on  the  day  John  told  her  that  he  loved 
her,  and  stopping  there  "  it  was  quite  natural — nothing 
could  be  more  so — that  they  should  glance  down 
Garden  Court  ;  because  Garden  Court  ends  in  the 
Garden,  and  the  Garden  ends  in  the  river,  and  that 
glimpse  is  very  bright  and  fresh  and  shining  on  a 
summer  day." 

The  Garden  does  not  end  in  the  river  now,  because 
the  Embankment  has  been  built  between  them  and 
stretches  from  Blackfriars  Bridge,  in  a  stony  comer 
against  which  poor  Jo,  of  Bleak  House,  sat  to  gnaw 
ai  the  broken  meats  Mr.  Snagsby  had  given  him, 
"  looking  up  at  the  great  Cross  on  the  summit  of  St. 
Paul's  Cathedral,"  and  ends  at  Westminster  Bridge, 
having  on  its  river-edge,  almost  midway  between  the 
two  Bridges,  the  worn,  cryptic  Cleopatra's  Needle 
guarded  by  the  figure  of  the  Sphinx  that  set  Kol)ert 
Buchanan  dreaming  : 

Not  on  the  desert  sands,  with  lions  ro:ir"-^g  around  her, 

Seeking  their  timid  prey  in  pools  of  the  bright  moonrise, 
But  here  by  the  glimmering  Thames,  in  silence  of  dreams 
profounder. 


244  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Crouches   the   Shape   of   Stone,   winged,   with   wondrous 


eves. 


Ancient' of  days,  she  was  crouching  Uke  this  ere  Christ  was 

Watching  the 'things  that  are  fled,  seeing  the  things  that  are 
fated.   .   .   . 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE    STRAND   AND    WESTMINSTER 

LAMB  loved  "  the  pavements  of  the  motley  Strand, 
crowded  with  to  and  fro  passengers,"  especially 
after  its  lamps  were  lit  :  so  he  wrote  to  Robert  Lloyd, 
and  in  one  of  his  minor  essays  he  says,  "  often,  when 
T  have  felt  a  weariness  or  distaste  at  home,  have  I 
nished  out  into  the  crowded  Strand  and  fed  my 
humour,  till  the  tears  have  wetted  my  cheek  for  un- 
utterable sympathies  with  the  multitudinous  moving 
picture  which  she  never  fails  to  present  at  all  hours, 
like  the  scenes  of  a  shifting  pantomime."  "  Is  any 
night-walk  comparable,"  he  asks  in  a  letter  to  Manning, 
"  to  a  walk  from  St.  Paul's  to  Charing  Cross  ?  "  And 
writing  to  Wordsworth  of  his  love  for  London  and  his 
walks  at  night  about  her  teeming  streets,  he  says,  "  I 
often  shed  tears  in  the  Strand  from  fulness  of  joy  in 
so  much  life."  Dr.  Johnson  agreed  with  Boswcll 
that  Fleet  Street  always  had  "  a  very  animated 
appearance,  but,"  he  added,  "  I  think  the  full  tide 
of  human  existence  is  at  Charing  Cross." 

Could  they  return  to  it,  they  would  fmd  the  char- 
acter of  the  Strand  unchanged  in  these  respects,  so  it 
is  fitting  everyway  that  it  should  also  be  more  crowded 
with  imaginary  people  than  any  other  street  in  London. 
Most  of  it  has  been  widened  ;  Butcher  Row,  which 
had  a  coffee-shop  that  Johnson  used  to  frequent,  has 

246 


246  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

been  replaced  by  the  Law  Courts,  but  it  retains  yet 
a  few  of  its  old  houses,  and  some  of  its  ancient  by- 
ways, such  as  Devereux  Court,  Strand  Lane,  and  the 
steep,  narrow  George  Court  that  you  enter  down  a 
flight  of  steps.  Ralph,  in  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's 
Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestle,  was  "  'prentice  to  a 
grocer  in  the  Strand "  ;  he  appears  in  one  scene 
dressed  as  a  May-lord  and  singing  : 

And  by  the  common  counsel  of  my  fellows  in  the  Strand, 
With  gilded  staff,  and  crossed  scarf,  the  May-lord  here  I 
stand. 

That  was  when  a  may-pole  stood  in  the  Strand, 
opposite  Somerset  House,  before  St.  Mary-le-Strand 
was  built  there.  All  the  scenes  of  Shirley's  Lady  of 
Pleasure  are  laid  in  the  Strand,  mostly  in  the  houses 
of  Sir  Thomas  Born  well,  or  of  Celestina,  a  young 
widow,  who  rebukes  her  Steward  when  he  would^ 
check  her  extravagance  : 

My  entertainments  shall 
Be  oftener,  and  more  rich.     Who  shall  control  me  ? 
I  live  i'  the  Strand,  whither  few  ladies  come 
To  live,  and  purchase  more  than  fame.     I  will 
Be  hospitable,  then,  and  spare  no  cost 
That  may  engage  all  generous  report 
To  trumpet  forth  my  bounty  and  my  bravery, 
Till  the  Court  envy,  and  remove.     I'll  have 
My  house  the  academy  of  wits,  who  shall 
Exalt  their  genius  with  rich  sack  and  sturgeon. 
Write  panegyrics  of  my  feasts,  and  praise 
The  method  of  my  witty  superfluities. 
The  horses  shall  be  taught,  with  frequent  waiting 
Upon  my  gates,  to  stop  in  their  career 
Toward  Charing  Cross,  spite  of  the  coachman's  fury  : 
And  not  a  tilter  but  shall  strike  his  plume, 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     247 

When  he  sails  by  my  window  ;  my  balcony 
Shall  be  the  courtier's  idol,  and  more  gazed  at 
Than  all  the  pageantry  at  Temple  Bar 
By  country  clients. 

The  carriages  and  the  tilters  going  by  towards  Charing 
Cross  would  be  on  their  way  to  the  Court,  which  was 
then  at  WTiitehall.  Master  Heriot  rode  that  way  on 
his  mule,  in  The  Fortunes  of  Nigel,  past  the  lordly 
mansions  of  the  Strand,  past  Charing  Cross,  "  which 
was  no  longer  the  pleasant  solitary  village  at  which 
the  judges  were  wont  to  breakfast  on  their  way  to 
Westminster  Hall,"  and  so  round  to  the  Palace  of 
James  I,  in  WTiitehall.  If  you  have  read  The  Heart 
of  Midlothian,  you  will  know  that  when  Jeanie  Deans 
came  to  London  she  stayed  with  her  friend  Mrs.  Glass, 
who  kept  a  fashionable  snuff-shop  in  the  Strand  ;  and 
in  the  Strand  lived  Miss  La  Creevy — the  miniature 
painter :  Mrs.  Nickleby,  with  Nicholas  and  Kate, 
lodged  with  her  there  when  they  first  came  up  from 
the  country. 

All  up  and  down  the  Strand  go  the  people  of 
Ciissing's  Town  Traveller,  In  the  Year  of  Jubilee,  The 
Nether  World,  and  The  Unclassed.  Ida  Starr,  in  The 
I^nclassed,  brought  Wymark  with  her  one  evening 
from  under  the  Pall  Mall  colonnade,  to  her  home. 
"  She  led  the  way  into  the  Strand.  At  no  great 
distance  from  Temple  Bar  she  turned  into  a  small 
court."  lliis  was  Thanet  Place  ;  it  was  a  cul  de  sac, 
a  blank  wall  at  the  end  shutting  it  off  from  the  Temple, 
and  its  two  rows  of  trim  neat  houses,  with  creepers 
growing  over  them,  with  their  small-paned  windows, 
the  two  white  steps  before  their  little  green,  brass- 
knockered  front  doors,  looked  like  a  qmci  old  street 


248  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

in  some  little  country  town.  A  London  book  pub- 
lished last  year  tells  us  that  Thanet  Place  is  still  there, 
but  its  entrance  is  so  narrow  that  nearly  everybody 
passes  without  noticing  it.  I  knew  it  very  well,  but 
it  was  wiped  out  some  years  ago  ;  if  it  is  still  there 
I  am  one  of  those  who  are  unable  to  find  it,  or  we 
would  go  there,  for  Wymark  went  so  frequently,  and 
some  of  the  most  poignant  things  in  Gissing's  book 
happened  in  Ida  Starr's  obscure,  small  dwelling  there. 
When  Jack,  in  Foote's  Lame  Lover,  is  recommending 
Charles  Woodford  to  his  sister,  he  assures  her  that 
"  Mrs  Congo,  at  the  Grecian  coffee-house,  says  he's 
the  soberest  youth  that  comes  to  the  house."  If  you 
go  up  Devereux  Court,  also  opposite  the  Law  Courts, 
you  may  see  all  that  is  left  of  the  Grecian — the  bust 
of  Lord  Devereux  stands  above  its  door,  as  it  stood 
above  the  door  of  the  house  when  Addison  and  Steele 
and  their  friends  frequented  it.  Across  the  road, 
beside  the  Law  Courts,  is  a  remnant  of  Clement's  Inn, 
a  small  and  mangled  remnant,  all  unlike  the  Clement's 
Inn  of  old  houses  and  pleasant  gardens  of  which  Fanny 
Bolton's  father  was  one  of  the  gatekeepers  ;  and  all 
unlike  the  Clement's  Inn  that  was  known  to  Falstaif 
and  Justice  Shallow.  "  I  was  once  of  Clement's 
Inn,"  Shallow  boasts  to  his  cousin  Silence  ;  "  where 
I  think  they  will  talk  of  mad  Shallow  yet  ;  "  he  re- 
minds Falstaff,  when  the  fat  knight  comes  to  him  for 
recruits,  of  the  cunning  little  fellow  he  had  seen 
fencing  at  Mile  End  Green,  in  the  old  days  when  he 
"  lay  at  Clement's  Inn  ;  "  and  stih  bragging  of  the 
wild  life  he  lived  there  he  sighs,  "  Ha  !  cousin  Silence, 
that  thou  hads't  seen  that  that  this  knight  and  I 
have  seen.     Ha  !    Sir   John,   said   I   well  ?  "     "  We 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     249 

have  heard  the  chimes  at  midnight,  Master  Shallow," 
Falstaff  answers  darkly,  but  to  Bardolph  he  subse- 
quently confides,  "  Lord,  Lord  !  how  subject  we  old 
men  are  to  this  vice  of  lying.  This  same  starved 
justice  hath  done  nothing  but  prate  to  me  of  the 
wildness  of  his  youth  and  the  feats  he  hath  done  about 
Tumbull  Street  ;  and  every  third  word  a  lie,  duer 
paid  to  the  hearer  than  the  Turks  tribute.  I  do 
remember  him  at  Clement's  Inn  like  a  man  made 
after  supper  of  a  cheese-paring." 

In  the  middle  of  the  road,  before  Clement's  Inn, 
is  the  Church  of  St.  Clement  Danes.  They  were  not  the 
chimes  of  this  church  that  Falstaff  and  Shallow  had 
heard  at  midnight,  for  it  was  rebuilt  in  the  seventeenth 
century  ;  but  there  has  been  a  church  here  since  the 
eleventh  century  ;  and  this  present  church  is  the  one 
at  which  Dr.  Johnson  was  a  regular  attendant,  and 
his  pew  is  to  be  seen  within  it.  Clement's  Inn  spread 
over  much  of  the  ground  that  is  covered  by  Aldwich  ; 
Mr.  Gudge,  of  Albert  Smith's  Christopher  Tadpole, 
had  his  chambers  in  a  court  in  the  heart  of  it,  one  end 
of  which  was  "  entirely  taken  up  with  a  large  hall, 
with  steps,  and  a  door,  and  such  a  knocker  !  evidently 
intended  for  the  use  of  some  ogre  residing  there,  who 
lives  entirely  upon  broiled  clients,  garnished  with 
fricassed  indentures."  He  describes  the  garden,  with 
the  ornaments  adorning  it,  that  are  "  compromises 
between  monumental  urns  and  fancy  flower-pots. 
The  figure  in  the  middle  is  the  greatest  compromise 
of  all.  The  original  artist  evidently  conceived  a  great 
idea,  but  got  hazy  in  his  mind  as  to  the;  proper  way  of 
carrying  it  out  ;  and  so,  vaccilating  feebly  between  a 
statue  and  a  fountain  and  a  sun-dial,  he  effected  a 


250  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

compromise  between  all  three.  As  it  is,  the  figure  is 
typical  of  the  intelligent  negro,  who,  crouching  down 
in  an  attitude  of  supplication,  whilst  he  balances  a 
sun-dial  on  his  head — ^in  the  infantile  attitude  of  '  hot 
pies  ' — implies  that  although  he  is  a  man  and  a  brother, 
he  is  quite  up  to  the  time  of  day."  This  one  authentic 
relic  of  the  old  Clement's  Inn  still  survives,  and  you 
may  see  it  where  it  has  been  re-erected  in  Temple 
Garden. 

Aldwych  also  replaces  Holywell  Street,  and  Wych 
Street,  where  you  find  Jack  Sheppard,  in  Ainsworth's 
romance,  serving  his  apprenticeship  ;  but  if  you  walk 
round  Aldwych  you  will  still  come  to  Drury  Lane, 
where  Dick  Swiveller  lodged  over  a  tobacconist's, 
involved  in  monetary  difficulties  which  he  explained  to 
Fred  Trent,  when  Fred  called  upon  him  there.  He 
sent  out  to  order  dinner  in  for  both  of  them,  and 
afterwards  made  a  careful  note  in  his  pocket-book, 
remarking,  in  response  to  Fred's  sneer  at  his  ostenta- 
tion of  business  :  "I  enter  in  this  little  book  the 
names  of  the  streets  that  I  can't  go  down  while  the 
shops  are  open.  This  dinner  to-day  closes  Long  Acre. 
I  bought  a  pair  of  boots  in  Queen  Street  last  week, 
and  made  that  no  thoroughfare  too.  There's  only 
one  avenue  to  the  Strand  left  open  now,  and  I  shall 
have  to  stop  up  that  to-night  with  a  pair  of  gloves. 
The  roads  are  closing  so  fast  in  every  direction  that, 
in  about  a  month's  time,  unless  my  aunt  sends  me  a 
remittance,  I  shall  have  to  go  three  or  four  miles  out 
of  town  to  get  over  the  way." 

Back  in  the  Strand,  on  the  other  side  of  St.  Clement's 
church,  are  Essex  Street  and  Norfolk  Street  ;  in 
Essex  Street  Dr.  Johnson  had  one  of  his  many  clubs 


THE  STRAXD  AND  WESTMINSTER     251 

at  the  Essex  Head,  and  Charley  Tudor,  a  clerk  at 
Somerset  House,  in  Trollope's  Three  Clerks,  "  had  his 
house  of  call  in  a  cross  lane  running  between  Essex 
Street  and  Norfolk  Street."  He  was  in  and  out  of 
the  place  a  good  deal,  and  foolishly  became  affianced 
to  the  barmaid  there.  Trollope  calls  it  "  The  Cat 
and  Whistle,"  but  I  am  inclined  to  think  it  was  the 
Old  Cheshire  Cheese,  an  old  tavern,  in  a  cross 
lane  between  Essex  Street  and  Norfolk  Street,  that 
no  writer  on  London  ever  says  anything  about. 
Higher  up  the  Strand  is  Somerset  House,  where 
Charley  Tudor  was  a  clerk,  and  where  Mr.  Minns,  of 
Dickens's  first  story,  Mr.  Minns  and  his  Cousin,  was 
a  clerk  before  him.  But  long  before  either  of  them, 
in  the  days  of  Charles  II,  Pepys  was  a  frequent  visitor 
at  Somerset  House,  when  the  Queen  Mother  had  her 
palace  there  ;  and  a  decade  or  so  before  Pepys  went 
there,  when  it  was  Queen  Henrietta  Maria's  dower 
house,  Randolph  walked  in  its  grounds, 

Where  glittering  courtiers  in  their  tissues  stalked, 

and  witnessed  an  incident  which  he  describes  in  his 
verses,  "  On  a  Maid  seen  by  a  Scholar  in  Somerset 
House  Garden." 

Mr  Gammon,  in  Gissing's  Town  Traveller,  loved  to 
ride  down  the  Strand  on  a  bus.  "  He  enjoyed  a 
'  block,'  and  was  disappointed  unless  he  saw  the 
policeman  at  Wellington  Street  holding  up  his  hand 
whilst  the  cross  traffic  from  north  and  south  rolled 
gradually  through.  It  always  reminded  him  of  the 
Bible  story — Moses  parting  the  waters  of  the  Red 
Sea."  One  day  by  chiince,  Miss  Waghom  and  her 
young  man,  Mr.  Nibby,  climbed  on  to  the  same  bus 


252  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

and  sat  behind  him  ;  Miss  Waghorn  hailed  him,  and 
introduced  the  two  gentlemen,  and,  "  the  bus  drawing 
slowly  near  a  popular  wine  shop,"  on  Mr.  Nibby's 
suggestion  they  all  got  down  and  turned  into  that 
shop,  where  "  the  dark  narrow  space  before  the 
counter  or  bar  was  divided  off  with  wooden  partitions 
as  at  a  pawnbroker's  ;  each  compartment  had  a  high 
stool  for  the  luxuriously  inclined,  and  along  the  wall 
ran  a  bare  wooden  bench."  From  which  description 
one  easily  recognises  Short's,  which  is  opposite 
Somerset  House.  Wellington  Street  runs  south  to 
Waterloo  Bridge,  which  was  Hood's  Bridge  of  Sighs  ; 
and  north,  past  the  bow  fronted  office  in  which  Dickens 
used  to  edit  Household  Words  (with  the  Lyceum 
opposite,  as  he  mentions  in  one  of  his  reprinted 
articles)  ;  past  Maiden  Lane,  where  Turner  was  bom 
over  his  father's  barber  shop  against  Hand  Court, 
and  where  Thackeray's  Philip  went  to  a  concert  at 
the  Cyder  Cellars,  being  tired  of  the  opera  at  Co  vent 
Garden  ;  by  Russell  Street,  where  Lamb  and  his 
sister  lived,  where  still  remains  something  of  Will's 
famous  coffee-house,  to  which  the  wits  went  to  meet 
Dryden,  and  in  which  Lytton  puts  a  scene  of  his  Not 
So  Bad  As  We  Seem — Russell  Street,  where  Johnson 
first  met  Boswell  at  No.  8,  and  where,  long  before 
that,  the  Rose  tavern  used  to  stand,  to  which  Shirley 
refers  in  his  play,  Hyde  Park,  when  Lord  Bonvile 
reassures  Julietta  that  Venture  and  Bonavent,  who 
have  gone  away  from  them  breathing  fire  and 
slaughter,  will  not  fight,  but  that 

A  cup  of  sackj  and  Anthony  at  the  Rose 

Will  reconcile  their  furies  ; 

■ — and  so  into  Bow  Street. 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     253 

Wycherley,  who  lived  on  the  west  side  of  Bow  Street, 
places  a  scene  of  his  Plain  Dealer  at  The  Cock  there. 
The  police-station  fills  the  site  of  the  house  in  which, 
first,  Waller  lived,  and  afterwards  Fielding,  whilst 
he  was  writing  Tom  Jones.  In  one  of  the  Sketches 
by  Boz  the  ubiquitous  Dickens  pictures  the  prisoners 
being  taken  away  from  Bow  Street  station  in  the 
prison  van  ;  and  at  Bow  Street,  as  you  may  read  at 
full  in  Oliver  Twist,  the  Artful  Dodger  was  brought 
up  before  the  magistrate  on  a  charge  of  pocket- 
picking  and  committed  for  trial,  Noah  Claypole,  under 
Fagin's  directions,  being  among  the  audience,  disguised 
as  a  countryman,  to  witness  what  happened.  Mr. 
Bows,  of  Pendennis,  was  "  employed  as  pianoforte 
player,  to  accompany  the  eminent  lyrical  talent  which 
nightly  delighted  the  public  at  the  Fielding's  Head 
in  Covent  Garden  :  and  where  was  held  a  little  club 
called  the  Back  Kitchen.  Numbers  of  Pen's  friends 
frequented  this  very  merry  meeting.  The  Fielding's 
Head  had  been  a  house  of  entertainment  iilmost  since 
the  time  when  the  famous  author  of  Tom  Jones  pre- 
sided as  magistrate  in  the  neighbouring  Bow  Street." 
When  Lord  Castlewood  and  Lord  Mohun  quaiTclled 
in  the  Greyhound,  at  Charing  Cross,  and  went  away  to 
fight  that  fatal  duel  in  Leicester  Fields  (which  is  now 
Leicester  Square)  it  was  given  out,  so  as  to  allay  sus- 
picion of  their  purpose,  that  "  the  dispute  was  over 
now,  and  the  parties  were  all  going  away  to  my  Lord 
Mohun's  house  in  Bow  Street,  to  drink  a  bottle  more 
before  going  to  bed." 

Mr.  Miims,  to  whom  we  have  recently  referred, 
lived  for  twenty  years  in  Tavist(jck  Street,  Covent 
Garden,    continually    falling    out    with    his   landlord. 


254  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

giving  him  notice  to  quit  on  the  first  day  of  every 
quarter  and  as  regularly  countermanding  it  on  the 
second.  The  old  man  who  begins  the  story  of  The 
Old  Curiosity  Shop  was  fond  of  roaming  through 
Co  vent  Garden  at  sunrise,  "  in  the  spring  or  summer, 
when  the  fragrance  of  sweet  flowers  is  in  the  air, 
overpowering  even  the  unwholesome  steams  of  last 
night's  debauchery  and  driving  the  dusky  thrush, 
whose  cage  has  hung  outside  a  garret  window  all 
night  long,  half  mad  with  joy."  Ruth  and  Tom 
Pinch,  in  Martin  Chuzzlewit,  used  to  enjoy  wandering 
about  the  great  markets,  and  "  many  and  many  a 
pleasant  stroll  they  had  in  Co  vent  Garden,  snuffling 
up  the  perfume  of  the  fruits  and  flowers,  wondering 
at  the  magnificence  of  the  pine-apples  and  melons  ; 
catching  glimpses  down  side  avenues  of  rows  and  rows 
of  old  women  seated  on  inverted  baskets  shelling 
peas  ;  "  when  David  Copperfield,  working  at  the 
Blacking  Factory  in  Blackfriars  Road,  took  his  half 
hour  off  for  tea  and  had  no  money,  he  strolled 
"  as  far  as  Co  vent  Garden  Market,  and  stared  at  the 
pine-apples  ;  "  and  later,  after  his  aunt  had  made 
him  a  young  man  of  means  and  he  was  lodging  with 
Mrs.  Crupp,  in  Buckingham  Street,  Strand,  he  came 
and  "  bought  a  little  dessert  in  Covent  Garden,"  in 
preparation  for  that  dinner  to  which  Steerforth  and 
his  friend  Grainger  were  coming.  It  was  shortly 
before  that,  when  he  and  Steerforth  both  happened 
to  be  staying  the  night  at  the  Golden  Cross  Hotel,  in 
the  Strand,  that  they  went  together  and  saw  Julius 
Caesar  acted  at  the  Covent  Garden  Theatre. 

"  One   brilliant    September   morning,    as    Huxter," 
of  Pendennis,  "  was  regaling  himself  with  a  cup  of 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     255 

coffee  at  a  stall  in  Covent  Garden,  having  spent  a 
delicious  night  dancing  at  Vauxhall,"  he  saw  Captain 
Costigan  "  reeling  down  Henrietta  Street,  with  a 
crowd  of  hooting  blackguard  boys  at  his  heels  :  he 
"  dived  down  the  alleys  by  Drury  Lane  Theatre," 
making  for  Clements  Inn  where  he  had  his  chambers. 
Warrington,  of  The  Virginians,  lodged  and  entertained 
his  friends  at  the  Bedford  Head,  which  is  in  Covent 
Garden,  at  the  comer  of  Henrietta  Street ;  there  was 
an  early  morning  when  Dr.  Johnson  arrived  in  Covent 
Garden,  "  on  a  frolic,"  with  Beauclerk  and  other  of 
his  friends,  and  joyously  insisted  on  helping  the 
porters  to  unload  their  carts  ;  and  Wycherley,  Far- 
quhar,  and  other  playwrights  before  and  after  them 
have  laid  more  scenes  in  Covent  Garden  than  I  can 
remember. 

In  Cecil  Street,  Strand,  which  made  way  for  part 
of  the  Hotel  Cecil,  lived  Dickens  himself,  for  a  while  ; 
and  he  put  Mr.  Watkins  Tottle,  of  the  Sketches  by  Boz, 
to  lodge  in  a  small  parlour  in  the  same  street.  Just 
up  Adam  Street,  is  the  Adelphi  Hotel,  that  is  associ- 
ated with  an  important  incident  in  Pickwick.  Here 
Emily  Wardle  and  her  father  stayed,  when  they  came 
to  town,  and  Mr.  Snodgrass,  calling  whilst  old  Wardle, 
was  out,  made  timorous  but  successful  love  to  Emily, 
and  was  departing  when  he  heard  Mr.  Wardle  and  a 
party  of  guests  coming  up  the  stairs,  ran  back  in  a 
panic,  lost  his  way  in  the  passages,  and  concealed 
liimself  in  Mr.  Wardle's  bedroom.  The  fat  boy,  sent 
in  for  something  else,  discovered  him  there  and  inad- 
vertently betrayed  him,  and  after  an  outburst  of 
wrath  against  his  deception,  Mr.  Wardle  not  only 
forgave  him  and  consented  to  his  suit,  but  ho  was 


256  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

allowed  to  sit  down  next  to  Emily  and  dine  with  her 
and  her  father,  Mr.  Pickwick,  Mr.  Tupman,  Mr.  Perker, 
Arabella  and  her  brother  Ben  Allen,  and  so  made  the 
Adelphi  Hotel  a  more  dazzling  place  than  it  looks. 

Villiers  Street  is  built  over  what  was  part  of  York 
House,  Wolsey's  Palace,  before  the  Duke  of  Bucking- 
ham contrived  to  deprive  him  of  it,  and  Shakespeare's 
Henry  VIII  gives  you  a  scene  in  its  Presence  Chamber, 
with  the  Cardinal  seated  in  state  entertaining  his 
guests  at  a  banquet,  during  which  the  King  arrives, 
masqued  as  a  shepherd,  and  dances  with  Anne  Boleyn. 
Charing  Cross  railway  station  has  swallowed  up 
Hungerford  Street,  which  led  down  to  Hungerford 
Market,  and  Hungerford  Stairs,  and  the  Blacking 
factory  where  Dickens  himself  worked  as  a  boy,  as 
David  Copperfield  worked  in  the  factory  at 
Blackfriars.  At  No.  14,  Buckingham  Street  lived,  in 
succession,  Pepys,  Swift's  Harley,  Earl  of  Oxford, 
and  Etty  and  Clarkson  Stanfield,  the  painters.  Peter 
the  Great  is  said  to  have  occupied  the  corner  house 
immediately  opposite  this  :  and  we  know  that  it  was 
once  occupied  by  the  novelist,  William  Black  ;  but 
more  to  our  purpose  is  the  fact  that,  in  his  happier 
days,  David  Copperfield  had  chambers  in  this  same 
comer  house.  They  saw  an  advertisement  that  "  in 
Buckingham  Street,  in  the  Adelphi,  there  was  to  be 
let  furnished,  with  a  view  of  the  river,  a  singularly 
desirable  and  compact  set  of  chambers  ;  "  and  he  and 
his  Aunt,  Betsy  Trot  wood,  promptly  went  to  look  at 
them  : 

"  The  advertisement  directed  us  to  apply  to  Mrs  Crupp  on 
the  premises,  and  we  rang  the  area  bell,  which  we  supposed 
to  communicate  with  Mrs  Crupp.     It  was  not  until  we  had 


^P^l^afet^- 


fred^/dcock. 


"  //  if  niu  o/  t/iosi-  Hooks  that  aiT  li^al  nooks  ;  ami  it  contains  a  little  Hall  7i'ith 
a  lantern  in  its  ro»/."  "  Juluiin  Drooti." 

Chapter  13 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     257 

rung  three  or  four  times  that  we  could  prevail  on  Mrs.  Crupp 
to  communicate  with  us,  but  at  last  she  appeared,  being  a 
stout  lady  with  a  flounce  of  flannel  petticoat  below  a  nankeen 
gown. 

"  '  Let  us  see  these  chambers  of  yours,  if  you  please^  ma'am,' 
said  my  aunt. 

"  '  For  this  gentleman  ?  '  said  Mrs.  Crupp,  feeling  in  her 
pocket  for  the  keys. 

"  '  Yes,  for  my  nephew,'  said  my  aunt. 

"  '  And  a  sweet  set  they  is  for  sich  ! '  said  Mrs.  Crupp. 

"  So  we  went  upstairs.  They  were  on  the  top  of  the  house 
— a  great  point  with  my  aunt,  being  near  the  fire-escape — 
and  consisted  of  a  Httle  half-blind  entry  where  you  could  see 
hardly  anything,  a  little  stone-blind  pantry  where  you  could 
see  nothing  at  all,  a  sitting-room  and  a  bed-room.  The 
furniture  was  rather  faded,  but  quite  good  enough  for  me  ; 
and,  sure  enough,  the  river  was  outside  the  windows." 

Thence  went  David  Copperfield  every  day  to  walk 
along  the  Strand  to  Mr.  Spenlow's  office  in  Doctor's 
Commons  ;  in  these  rooms  he  entertained  Steerforth, 
and  Uriah  Heep,  whom  he  led,  by  his  damp,  cold 
hand  "  up  the  dark  stairs,  to  prevent  him  knocking 
his  head  against  anything  ;  "  here  he  gave  a  notable 
feast  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Micawber  and  Traddles,  and 
when  they  departed,  towards  midnight,  he  held  his 
candle  "  over  the  banisters  to  light  them  down." 
Here  he  had  Mr.  Dick  to  stay  with  him,  and,  to  wean 
him  from  his  endless  task  on  the  Memorial  into  which 
King  Charles's  head  invariably  intruded,  Traddles 
found  work  for  him,  and  Mr.  Dick  used  to  sit  at  "  a 
table  by  the  window  in  Buckingham  Street  "  copying 
legal  documents  ;  here  David's  aunt  came  to  live  with 
him  after  she  had  lost  her  money,  and  of  an  evening 
Traddles  would  read  famous  political  speeches  out  of 

17 


258  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Enfield's  Speaker  whilst  David  took  them  down  in 
shorthand,  bent  on  learning  that  art,  and  his  aunt 
and  Mr.  Dick  sat  and  listened  and  added  to  the 
realistic  reproduction  of  a  Parliamentary  debate  by- 
throwing  in  an  occasional  "  Hear  !  Hear  !  "  One 
could  go  on  with  similar  reminiscences.  "  There  was 
an  old  Roman  Bath  in  those  days  at  the  bottom  of 
one  of  the  streets  out  of  the  Strand — it  may  be  there 
still — in  which  I  had  many  a  cold  plunge,"  says 
David  ;  and  if  you  go  into  the  uneven,  precipitous 
Strand  Lane,  a  few  yards  east  of  Somerset  House,  you 
will  find  that  Roman  Bath  there  to  this  hour.  Re- 
membering these  things,  and  how  whilst  he  sojourned 
in  Buckingham  Street  David  Copperfield  was  dis- 
tracted with  love  for  Dora  Spenlow,  agitated  over  the 
tragedy  of  Steerforth's  treachery,  and  Little  Em'ly's 
disappearance,  going  out  to  meet  Mr.  Peggotty,  and 
help  him  in  his  vain  search  for  her — remembering  all 
these  things  and  such  other  minute  details  of  David's 
everyday  life,  we  are  as  strongly  drawn  to  this  house 
as  if  it  were  Dickens  who  had  actually  inhabited  it 
and  not  only  the  people  of  his  imagination. 

Mr.  Brownlow,  of  Oliver  Twist,  was  staying  at  a 
house  in  Craven  Street,  which  is  the  last  street  but 
one  on  this  side,  near  the  top  of  the  Strand,  when 
Oliver  found  him  and  was  restored  to  him  by  Rose 
Mayley  ;  and  the  last  street  of  all,  Northumberland 
Street,  when  it  was  named  Hartshorn  Lane,  contained 
the  house  in  which  Ben  Jonson  passed  his  boyhood. 

A  little  way  back,  over  the  road,  is  the  Golden  Cross 
Hotel,  which  has  been  rebuilt.  It  is  nowadays  a 
large  and  stately  edifice,  but  when  David  Copperfield 
put  up  there,  with  Steerforth,  it  was  "  a  mouldy  sort 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     259 

of  establishment."  Through  Steerforth's  intervention 
he  was  transferred  from  a  small  bed-chamber  which 
had  been  shut  up  like  a  family  vault  to  a  comfortable, 
large  front  room,  from  the  window  of  which  next 
morning  he  had  a  view  of  the  statue  of  King  Charles 
on  horseback,  which  still  stands  at  Charing  Cross 
looking  down  Whitehall.  Albert  Smith's  Christopher 
Tadpole  put  up  at  that  earlier  Golden  Cross  ;  and,  to 
say  nothing  of  others,  thither  went  Mr.  Pickwick  in  a 
cab,  which  he  chartered  from  St.  Martin's  le  Grand,  and 
when  he  alighted  there  the  cabman  wanted  to  fight  him 
outside  on  the  pavement  over  the  amount  of  his  fare, 
but  was  prevented  by  the  timely  appearance  of  Mr. 
Jingle,  who  afterwards  went  inside  with  Mr.  Pickwick, 
Mr.  Snodgrass,  Mr.  Winkle  and  Mr.  Tupman,  who  had 
been  waiting  there  for  their  chief,  and  being  duly 
refreshed  they  all  mounted  the  coach  and  set  out 
from  the  Golden  Cross  on  that  eventful  journey  to 
Rochester. 

Suckling  begins  his  Ballad  of  a   Wedding,  with  a 
reference  to  the  adjacent  Haymarket : 

At  Charing  Cross,  hard  by  the  way 
Where  we,  thou  know'st,  do  sell  our  hay  ; 

Lewis  Morris  singing  of  Trafalgar  Square,  which  opens 
from  the  Strand  and  Charing  Cross,  sketches  the 
crippled  beggar  who  sat  "  under  the  picture  gallery 
wall," 

A  face  as  pale  as  the  sheeted  dead, 
A  frail  body  propped  on  a  padded  crutch, 
And  lean  long  fingers,  which  flutter  the  keys 
Of  an  old  accordion  ; 


260  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

but  Henley  gives  the  finest  picture  of  the  place,  on  a 
golden  day  of  October,  when 

Trafalgar  Square 

(The  fountains  volleying  golden  glaze) 

Shines  like  an  angel-market.     High  aloft 

Over  his  couchant  Lions  in  a  haze 

Shimmering  and  bland  and  soft, 

A  dust  of  chrysoprase, 

Our  Sailor  takes  the  golden  gaze 

Of  the  saluting  sun,  and  flames  superb 

As  once  he  flamed  it  on  his  ocean  round. 

The  dingy  dreariness  of  the  picture-place, 

Turned  very  nearly  bright, 

Takes  on  a  luminous  transiency  of  grace, 

And  shows  no  more  a  scandal  to  the  ground. 

The  very  blind  man  pottering  on  the  kerb, 

Among  the  posies  and  the  ostrich  feathers 

And  the  rude  voices  touched  with  all  the  weathers 

Of  the  long,  varying  year. 

Shares  in  the  universal  alms  of  light. 

Up  beside  the  picture-place,  which  is  the  National 
Gallery,  runs  St.  Martin's  Lane,  and  down  St.  Martin's 
Lane,  one  snowy,  wintry  evening,  came  David  Copper- 
field,  on  his  way  home  from  Highgate  to  Buckingham 
Street. 

"  Now,  the  church  which  gives  its  name  to  the  Lane,  stood 
in  a  less  free  situation  at  that  time  ;  there  being  no  open 
space  before  it,  and  the  lane  winding  down  to  the  Strand.  As 
I  passed  the  steps  of  the  portico,  I  encountered  at  the  corner 
a  woman's  face.  It  looked  in  mine,  passed  across  the  narrow 
lane,  and  disappeared.  I  knew  it.  I  had  seen  it  somewhere. 
But  I  could  not  remember  where.  ...  On  the  steps  of  the 
church,  there  was  the  stooping  figure  of  a  man  who  had  put 
down  some  burden  on  the  smooth  snow  to  adjust  it ;  my 
seeing  the  face,  and  my  seeing  him  were  simultaneous.    .    .    . 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     261 

As  I  went  on,  he  rose,  turned  and  came  down  towards  me. 
I  stood  face  to  face  with  Mr  Peggotty  !  Then  I  remembered 
the  woman.  It  was  Martha,  to  whom  Emily  had  given  the 
money  that  night  in  the  kitchen.  Martha  Endell — side  by 
side  with  whom  he  would  not  have  seen  his  dear  niece,  Ham 
told  me,  for  all  the  treasures  wrecked  in  the  sea.  We  shook 
hands  heartily.     At  first,  neither  of  us  could  speak  a  word. 

"  '  Mas'r  Davy  ! '  he  said,  gripping  me  tight,  '  it  do  my  art 
good  to  see  you,  sir.     Well  met,  well  met  !  " 

They  went  for  shelter,  by  a  back  way,  into  the 
Golden  Cross,  where  Mr.  Peggotty  recounted  his 
wanderings  about  the  world,  trying  to  get  on  the 
track  of  Steerforth  and  the  girl  he  had  taken  away 
with  him. 

Young  Ferdinand,  in  Disraeli's  Henrietta  Temple, 
came  to  London  with  Mr.  Glastonbury,  and  a  hackney 
coach  carried  them  from  Bishopsgate  to  Charing  Cross 
and  deposited  them  at  Morley's  Hotel,  which  Disraeli 
speaks  of  as  in  Cockspur  Street,  but  it  is  now  in 
Trafalgar  Square  ;  and  next  morning  the  two  came 
out  together  to  see  the  town,  Ferdinand  talking  all 
the  way,  wild  with  excitement  : 

"  Is  this  Charing  Cross,  sir  ? — I  wonder  if  we  shall  ever  be 
able  to  get  over. — Is  this  the  fullest  part  of  the  town,  sir  ? — 
What  a  fine  day,  sir  ! — How  lucky  we  are  in  the  weather  ! — 
.  .  .  Who  is  that  ?— What  is  this  ?— The  Admiralty  ?  Oh, 
let  me  see  the  Admiralty  ! — The  Horse  Guards  ! — Oh,  where, 
where  } — Let  us  set  our  watches  by  the  Horse  Guards. — Mr. 
Glastonbury,  which  is  the  best  clock,  the  Horse  Guards'  or 
St  Paul's  ? — Is  that  the  Treasury  ?^Can  we  go  in  ? — That 
is  Downing  Street,  is  it  ? — Is  this  Charing  Cross  still,  or  is  it 
Padiamenl  Street  ? — Where  does  Charing  Cross  end,  and 
where  does  Parliament  Street  begin  ? — By  Jove,  I  see  West- 
minster Abbev  !  " 


262  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Downing  Street,  the  Government  offices,  and  Carlton 
Terrace  on  the  other  side  of  the  way,  have  associations 
with  TroUope's  great  novel.  The  Prime  Minister,  but 
since  we  have  come  as  far  as  the  Abbey  we  wUl  not  go 
back  for  them,  nor  for  one  or  two  reminiscences  of 
Spring  Gardens  and  Cannon  Row,  nor  for  many  of 
Whitehall,  that  looms  so  large  in  a  hundred  and  one 
Carolian  and  Cromwellian  plays  and  romances.  Even 
more  and  older  memories  are  gathered  about  this 
Westminster  area,  that  is  covered  by  Westminster 
Hall,  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  and  the  Abbey ; 
which  have  all,  except  the  Abbey,  been  rebuilt  within 
the  last  hundred  years.  These  are  not  the  Parliament- 
ary buildings  that  Hugh  and  Dennis,  the  hangman, 
came  lurking  round,  in  Barnahy  Rudge,  when  Dennis 
pointed  out  "  how  easy  it  was  to  get  into  the  lobby 
and  so  to  the  very  door  of  the  House  of  Commons." 
This  is  not  the  Westminster  Hall  that  Shakespeare 
knew  ;  nor  the  one  in  which  Wycherley  has  a  scene 
of  his  Plain  Dealer  ;  nor  the  one  to  which  Mr.  Haredale 
came  (again  in  Barnahy  Rudge)  and  met  Sir  John 
Chester  and  Mr.  Gashford  among  the  miscellaneous 
throng  that  flowed  in  and  out  through  its  lofty  door- 
way ;  but  it  is  the  Hall  in  which  Alaric  Tudor  and 
Undy  Scott,  of  TroUope's  Three  Clerks,  talked  of  the 
ruin  the  unscrupulous  Undy  had  brought  upon  his 
friend,  till  Alaric  came  near  to  losing  his  self-control 
and  resorting  to  violence.  They  walked  "  up  and 
down  the  immense  space  of  Westminster  Hall,"  Undy 
explaining  what  had  been  passing  within  on  the 
Parliamentary  Committee  of  which  he  was  a  member, 
and  at  the  crisis  of  the  interview,  when  Alaric  took 
hold  of  him  by  the  collar  of  his  coat,  were  "  standing 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     263 

at  the  upper  end  of  the  Hall — close  under  the  steps 
which  lead  to  the  House  of  Parliament." 

If  you  go  round  the  side  of  the  Abbey,  by  Great 
Smith  Street,  you  may  find  your  way  easily  into  Smith 
Square  ;  and  in  "  Church  Street,  Smith  Square,  Mill 
Bank,"  Lizzie  Hexam,  of  Our  Mutual  Friend,  lived, 
with  Jenny  Wren,  the  crippled  little  doll's  dressmaker. 
Bradley  Headstone  and  Charley  Hexam  called  there 
to  see  her,  crossing  the  Westminster  Bridge  and 
making  along  the  ^Middlesex  shore  towards  Millbank  : 

"  In  this  region  are  a  certain  little  street^  called  Church 
vStreet,  and  a  certain  little  blind  square,  called  Smith  Square, 
in  the  centre  of  which  last  retreat  is  a  very  hideous  church 
wnth  four  towers  at  the  four  corners,  generally  resembling 
some  petrified  monster,  frightful  and  gigantic,  on  its  back 
with  its  legs  in  the  air.  They  found  a  tree  near  by  in  a  corner, 
and  a  blacksmith's  forge,  and  a  timber  yard,  and  a  dealer's 
in  old  iron.  What  a  rusty  portion  of  a  boiler  and  a  great  iron 
wheel  or  so  meant  by  lying  half-buried  in  the  dealer's  forecourt, 
nobody  seemed  to  know  or  want  to  know.  .  .  .  After  making 
the  round  of  this  place,  and  noting  that  there  was  a  deadly 
kind  of  repose  on  it,  more  as  though  it  had  taken  laudanum 
than  fallen  into  a  natural  rest,  they  stopped  at  the  point  where 
the  street  and  the  square  joined,  and  where  there  were  some 
little  quiet  houses  in  a  row.  To  these  Charley  Hexam  finally 
led  the  way,  and  at  one  of  these  he  stopped.  '  This  must  be 
where  my  sister  lives,  sir.  This  is  where  she  came  for  a 
temporary  lodging  soon  after  father's  death.'  " 

He  knocked  ;  the  door  promptly  opened  with  a 
spring,  and  the  parlour  door  within,  standing  open, 
revealed  Jenny  Wren,  the  doll's  dressmaker,  to  them 
— "  a  child — a  dwarf — a  girl — a  something  sitting  in  a 
little  low  old-fashioned  arm-chair,  which  had  a  kind 
of  little  working  bench  before  it."     The  house  and  all 


264  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Church  Street  were  there  until  a  few  months  ago  ; 
now  they  have  been  knocked  down  and  carted  away, 
but  Smith  Square,  with  the  hideous  church  that  is 
too  large  for  it,  the  wood  yard,  and  general  litter,  and 
the  somnolent  air  that  hangs  over  everything,  are  all 
as  exactly  the  same  as  if  Dickens  had  only  written  of 
them  yesterday. 

You  make  acquaintance  with  Smith  Square  again 
in  Besant's  Beyond  the  Dreams  of  Avarice  ;  when  Ella 
Burley  came  over  from  America  with  her  Aunt  Lucinda 
to  establish  their  identities  and  prove  their  relation- 
ship to  the  multi-millionaire,  James  Calvert  Burley, 
who  had  practised  as  a  solicitor  in  England  until  his 
death  in  1875.  They  took  a  lodging  "  in  Westminster, 
so  as  to  be  on  the  spot,  close  to  Great  College  Street  ; 
in  fact,  it  was  in  Smith  Square,  where  stands  the  huge 
mass  of  stone  called  the  Church  of  St.  John  the 
Evangelist."  The  family  of  Burley  had  belonged  to 
the  Church  of  St.  John  "  since  the  creation  of  the 
parish  in  the  year  1716,"  and  Besant  compiles  a 
pedigree  of  them,  drawn  from  St.  John's  parish 
register.  Ella  and  her  Aunt  were  regular  attend- 
ants at  the  church  services,  and  you  can  easily 
identify  all  their  walks  about  the  locality — this,  for 
example  : 

"  They  walked  nearly  round  the  Square,  their  thoughts  far 
away.  Then  Ella  turned  into  a  street,  for  no  reason,  her  aunt 
following  her  ;  and  in  two  or  three  minutes  they  found  them- 
selves in  an  unexpected  place — a  Continental  place — which 
brought  their  thoughts  back  to  Westminster.  .  .  .  Ella  looked 
round  her,  awakened  by  the  unexpected.  For  she  stood 
suddenly  in  the  most  quiet  and  peaceful  spot  of  all  London, 
Houses  of  the  early  eighteenth  century,  with  porches,  and 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     265 

pillars,  and  flat  facades,  stand  round  this  place,  houses  built 
for  the  comfort  that  our  grandfathers  placed  so  far  above 
artistic  show  and  aesthetic  display." 

This  secluded  street  brings  them  into  Great  College 
Street,  and  in  Great  College  Street  is  the  house 
formerly  occupied  by  the  deceased  millionaire,  and 
now  tenanted  by  the  newly  married  Dr.  Lucien 
Calvert  and  his  wife,  who  are  among  the  numerous 
claimants  to  the  dead  man's  millions.  Before  Lucien 
and  his  wife,  Margaret,  took  it  he  brought  her  to  see 
the  place,  and — 

"  It  was,  she  found,  a  lovely  old  house.  Steps,  side  steps, 
with  a  good  old  iron  railing,  led  to  the  stoop  and  to  the  front 
door.  There  were  three  stories,  each  with  three  windows  ; 
there  was  a  steep  red-tiled  roof  with  dormer  windows.  Over 
the  whole  front  hung  a  thick  green  curtain  of  Virginia  creeper. 
...  On  the  other  side  of  the  street  was  the  old  grey  wall  of 
the  Cathedral  precincts — did  Edward  the  Confessor  build  that 
wall,  or  was  it  an  earlier  work  still  ? — the  work  of  Dunstan, 
what  time  His  Majesty  King  Edgar  endowed  the  Abbey  ?  " 

Here  is  another  description  of  it,  given  by  Lucy 
to  her  father  Sir  John  Burley,  another  claimant  to 
the  estate  : 

"  It  is  close  to  the  Houses  of  Parliament.  .  .  .  The  houses 
are  only  on  one  side  :  on  the  other  is  a  grey  stone  wall — the 
garden  wall  of  the  Abbey.  .  .  .  The  front  of  the  house  is 
covered  all  over  with  a  magnificent  creeper,  the  leaves  crimson 
and  purple  and  golden — it  is  like  a  glorified  house.  There  is 
a  red  tiled  roof,  there  is  a  rai.sed  door  and  steps  and  old-fashioned 
iron  railings.   .   .   .  The  street  is  called  Great  College  Street." 

And  the  beautiful  old  house  is  there  exactly  as  all 
those  people  of  Beyond  the  Dreams  of  Avarice  saw  it, 
and  looking  as  if  it  might  yet  prove  more  lasting  than 


266  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Besant's  story  about  it.  Whilst  Dr.  Calvert  was 
absent  every  day  about  his  duties  at  the  Children's 
Hospital  in  Buckingham  Palace  Road,  Margaret 
would  go  out  for  quiet  walks  "  in  the  Park,  or  about 
the  quiet  courts  of  the  Abbey  ;  "  and  after  she  had 
become  friendly  with  Ella,  they  would  sometimes  go 
together,  and  their  favourite  stroll  took  them  through 
the  obscure  doorway  near  the  end  of  Great  College 
Street  "  into  the  large  quiet  Square  called  Dean's 
Yard  ;  "  but  Margaret  knew  of  a  quieter  place  even 
than  this  : 

"  Under  an  archway,  across  an  open  court,  through  a  broad 
arched  corridor  she  led  the  girl  into  a  little  square  court,  sur- 
rounded by  a  stone  cloister  ;  in  the  midst  was  a  square  of  grass, 
with  a  fountain  that  ought  to  have  been  playing  but  was  not : 
tablets  on  the  walls  commemorated  dead  men's  names  and 
lives.  .  .  .  There  were  ancient  doors  and  ancient  windows 
of  crumbling,  worn  stone,  and  above  the  corridor  were  houses 
which  looked  as  if  they  were  built  what  time  great  Oliver  ruled 
the  realm.  '  This  is  the  Infirmary  Cloister,'  said  Margaret. 
'  It  is  the  quietest  place  in  the  world.  You  hear  nothing  in 
these  cloisters  of  the  outside  world — nothing  but  the  striking 
of  the  great  clock  :  you  see  nothing  but  the  Victoria  Tower.  .  .  . 
I  come  here  often  when  I  am  troubled.  .  .  .  Only  to  linger 
among  these  grey  old  stones  soothes  and  comforts  one.'  " 

Tarrant,  of  Gissing's  In  the  Year  of  Jubilee,  took 
lodgings  in  Great  College  Street,  when  he  was  working 
as  a  journalist,  and  anxious  to  regain  the  love  of  his 
deserted  wife  (the  one-time  Nancy  Lord)  who  was 
living  in  the  neighbourhood ;  and  his  walks  and 
sometimes  hers,  were  in  the  shadow  of  the  Houses  of 
Parliament,  in  Dean's  Yard,  and  thereabouts.  Gilbert 
Grail,  in  Thyrza,  would  spend  "  an  hour  of  his  Satur- 
day afternoon  in  Westminster  Abbey  ;  "  and  into  the 


THE  STRAND  AND  WESTMINSTER     267 

Abbey  went  Walter  Egremont,  and  sat  in  a  shadowed 
place  alone,  distracted  ^vitll  his  secret  love  for  Thyrza 
— there  in  the  same  place  where  his  poorer,  unsuccess- 
ful rival,  the  working  man,  Gilbert  Grail,  "  often 
walked  and  sought  solace  from  the  bitterness  of  his 
accursed  lot."  Margaret  Calvert  used  to  walk  in  the 
Abbey,  as  well  as  in  its  mouldering  cloisters  ;  and  she 
and  her  husband  would  attend  afternoon  service  there 
on  Sundays.  The  Abbey  holds  memories  of  greater 
and  more  splendid  scenes,  but  they  are  only  half 
imaginary,  A  gentleman  in  Shakespeare's  Henry 
VIII.  describes  Anne  Boleyn's  coronation  in  it  ;  the 
opening  scene  of  his  Henry  VI.  is  placed  in  it,  during 
the  funeral  ceremonies  of  Henry  V.  ;  and  a  memorable 
scene  of  Henry  IV.  is  enacted  in  its  ancient  Jerusalem 
Chamber. 

One  does  not  read  the  names  of  so  many  Kings  and 
Queens  and  great  men  on  its  ageing  monuments  and 
quit  what  Young  calls. 

That  solemn  mansion  of  the  royal  dead 

Where  passing  slaves  o'er  sleeping  monarchs  tread, 

without  recalling  Beaumont's  lines  "  On  the  Tombs 
in  Westminster  Abbey  "  : 

Mortality,  behold  and  fear, 

What  a  change  of  flesh  is  here  ! 

Think  how  many  royal  hones 

Sleep  within  this  heap  of  stones  ; 

Here  they  lie,  had  realms  and  lands, 

Who  now  want  strength  to  stir  their  hands  ; 

Where  from  their  pulpits  scaled  in  dust, 

They  preach,  '  In  greatness  is  no  trust  !  ' 

Here's  an  acre  sown  indeed 

With  the  richest,  royal'st  seed,   ,   ,  . 


268  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Here  the  bones  of  birth  have  cried, 

'  Though  gods  they  were,  as  men  they  died  ; '  .  ,  . 

Here's  a  world  of  pomp  and  state 

Buried  in  dust  .  .  . 

As  Beaumont,  who  was  himself  afterwards  brought 
here  to  be  buried,  walked  through  the  Abbey  musing 
of  these  things,  so  you  may  take  it  his  contemporary 
Dr.  Donne  was  no  stranger  to  the  place,  before  he 
wrote  in  one  of  his  Satires  : 

'Tis  sweet  to  talk  of  Kings.     At  Westminster, 

Said  I,  the  man  that  keeps  the  Abbey  tombs 

And  for  his  price  doth,  with  who  ever  comes. 

Of  all  our  Harrys  and  our  Edwards  talk. 

From  King  to  King,  and  all  their  kin,  can  walk  : 

Your  ears  shall  hear  nought  but  Kings  ;  your  eyes  meet 

Kings  only.     The  way  to  it  is  King's  Street. 

And  King  Street  is  one  of  the  ways  to  it  still.  Just 
outside  the  Abbey  waited  Falstaff  and  his  Page,  with 
Bardolph,  Pistol,  and  Justice  Shallow,  whilst  Henry  V. 
was  crowned  within  ;  and  here,  when  the  reformed 
Henry  with  his  train  came  forth,  he  had  the  heart  to 
snub  his  old  boon  companion  and  leave  the  prating 
Chief  Justice  to  have  Sir  John  and  all  his  company 
arrested  and  carried  off  to  the  Fleet  Prison. 

By  the  Abbey  is  St.  Margaret's  church,  dear  to  all 
book-lovers  as  the  burial  place  of  Caxton  ;  and  if  you 
are  there  at  the  right  hour,  you  may  come  away 
hearing,  as  Henley  heard, 

St  Margaret's  bells. 

Quiring  their  innocent,  old-world  canticles. 

Sing  in  the  storied  air 

All  rosy-and-golden,  as  with  memories 

Of  woods  at  evensong,  and  sands  and  seas 

Disconsolate  for  that  the  night  is  nigh. 


CHAPTER  XII 

PICCADILLY  AND   THE   PARKS 

IF  life  were  longer  and  books  need  have  no  limit, 
we  would  go  farther  up  the  river  in  the  footprints 
of  the  imaginary  people  who  haimt  those  parts  :  to 
Chelsea,  where  some  of  Henry  Kingsley's  and  some  of 
Gissing's  characters  lived  ;  to  Chiswick,  where  on  the 
Mall,  by  the  Thames,  stands  Walpole  House,  which 
is  Miss  Pinkerton's  Academy,  in  Vanity  Fair,  with 
Amelia  Sedley  and  Becky  Sharp  among  its  inmates  ; 
to  Richmond,  where,  to  say  nothing  of  many  another, 
Jeanie  Deans  was  taken  to  see  the  Queen  in  old 
Richmond  Palace.  But  life  and  books  being  what 
they  are,  we  go  back  instead  and  get  on  to  the  route 
that  Charley  Tudor,  of  The  Three  Clerks,  took  when, 
coming  from  his  office  in  Somerset  House,  "  he  went 
along  the  Strand,  over  the  crossing  under  the  statue 
of  Charles  on  horseback,  and  up  Pall  Mall  East  till  he 
came  to  the  opening  into  the  Park,  under  the  Duke  of 
York's  column."  He  noticed  the  colonnade  that 
stretched  up  Pall  Mall  from  the  corner  of  the  Hay- 
market,  but  this  is  gone  now,  or  I  would  have  qtioted 
the  vivid  scene  in  The  Unclasscd,  where  Waymark 
leans  smoking  against  one  of  its  pillars  and  first  makes 
acquaintance  with  Ida  Starr  there. 

Or,  instead  of  going  up  Pall  Mall  to  enter  it  by  the 
Duke  of  V(;rk's  column,  you  can  go  into  St.  James's 


270  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Park  by  the  Mall,  out  of  Charing  Cross,  and,  if  the 
living  crowd  in  it  does  not  sufficiently  interest  you, 
can  refill  it  with  the  real  people  and  the  dream  people 
it  has  known  :  Nigel,  who  walked  there  and  met 
Prince  Charles  with  his  courtiers,  and  presently  dis- 
graced himself  by  breaking  into  that  furious  affray 
with  Lord  Dalgamo  in  the  precincts  of  St.  James's 
Palace  ;  Pepys,  who  loved  the  place,  and  to  encounter 
Charles  IL  or  his  Queen,  or  some  of  the  Court 
favourites  in  its  pleasant  grounds  ;  those  men  and 
women  of  Wycherley's,  who  came  out  of  his  Love  in  a 
Wood  :  or  St.  James's  Park  ;  of  Congreve's,  out  of 
his  Way  of  the  World  ;  of  Vanbrugh's  and  Farquhar's, 
out  of  various  plays  of  theirs,  for  the  Park  was  never 
a  more  fashionable  or  more  popular  place  than  it  was 
in  the  brilliant,  joyous,  wicked  days  of  the  Restora- 
tion. In  the  Park,  here.  Captain  Booth,  the  husband 
of  Fielding's  Amelia,  would  take  his  walks  abroad, 
and  was  here  on  the  day  he  met  Colonel  Bath  with 
some  other  officers,  and  being  insulted  by  the  Colonel 
said,  "  If  we  were  not  in  the  Park  I  would  thank  you 
very  properly  for  that  compliment."  Saying  they 
could  soon  be  in  a  convenient  place, 

"  The  Colonel  bid  him  come  along,  and  strutted  forward 
directly  up  Constitution  Hill,  to  Hyde  Park,  Booth  following 
him  at  first,  and  afterwards  walking  before  him,  till  they  came 
to  that  place  which  may  be  properly  called  the  field  of  blood, 
being  that  part  a  little  to  the  left  of  the  ring,  which  heroes  have 
chosen  for  their  exit  out  of  this  world." 

The  Colonel  took  off  his  wig  and  coat  and  laid  them 
on  the  grass  ;  they  both  drew,  and  after  a  few  furious 
passes.  Booth  ran  him  through  the  body,  and  as  he 
lay  on  the  ground,  a  few  words  of  explanation  made 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         271 

it  clear  that  he  had  msulted  Booth  under  a  misappre- 
hension ;  they  shook  hands  warmly,  and  were  recon- 
ciled. The  Colonel's  injury  was  slight,  but  Booth 
insisted  on  running  to  Grosvenor  Gate  to  fetch  a  chair 
and  have  him  carried  home.  Ralph  Nickleby,  crossing 
St.  James's  Park  from  Pimlico,  on  his  road  home,  was 
caught  in  a  storm  and  took  shelter  under  one  of  the 
trees,  and  was  accosted  there  by  Mr.  Brooker,  the 
broken  wretch  whom  he  had  wronged. 

Quite  late  one  evening,  after  dining,  young  Everett 
Wharton  and  Ferdinand  Lopez  in  Trollope's  Prime 
Minister,  "  strolled  out  into  St.  James's  Park  ;  " 
Everett  was  in  no  pleasant  humour,  and  as  they  got 
round  in  front  of  Buckingham  Palace,  they  came  to 
words,  and  along  Birdcage  Walk,  near  Storey's  Gate, 
Lopez  said  an  abrupt  good-night  and  went  off  alone. 
It  was  by  now  dark,  and  having  a  suspicion  that 
Everett  was  slightly  the  worse  for  drink,  Lopez 
hesitated,  feeling  that  he  ought  to  look  after  him. 
Hearing  a  curious  rush  and  scuffle  in  the  dark  behind 
him,  he  ran  back  to  find  Everett  on  the  ground,  a 
man  kneeling  on  him  and  two  women  rifling  his 
pockets.  He  nished  to  the  rescue,  there  was  a  hot, 
brief  giving  and  taking  of  blows,  and  the  women  and 
the  man  had  fled,  and  Everett  had  risen  and  was 
leaning  against  the  railings.  He  was  wounded  and 
bleeding ;  his  watch  and  his  money  were  stolen. 
"  They  walked  very  slowly  away  towards  the  steps  of 
the  Duke  of  Yf^rk's  column.  ...  At  the  foot  of  the 
steps  they  met  a  policeman,  to  whom  they  told  llicir 
story,  and  who,  as  a  matter  of  course,  was  filled  with 
an  immediate  desire  to  arrest  them  both.  .  .  .  J^>iit 
after  ten  minutes'  par](;y,  during  wlii'  li  Wharton  sat 


272  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

on  the  bottom  step  and  Lopez  explained  all  the 
circumstances,  he  consented  to  get  them  a  cab  ;  " 
and  the  reputation  for  this  rescue  afterwards  stood 
the  cunning  Lopez  in  good  stead  with  Everett's  father, 
and  particularly  with  his  sister. 

In  St.  James's  Park,  in  St.  James's  Palace,  and  in 
St.  James's  Square,  which  lies  outside,  off  Pall  Mall, 
Ainsworth  has  scenes  of  his  novel.  Si.  James's,  Tom 
Taylor  of  his  dramas,  Lady  Clancarty,  and  'Twixt  Axe 
and  Crown,  and  Thackeray  of  Esmond.  Pendennis 
walked  with  the  Major  "  through  the  Green  Park  " 
(which  separates  St.  James's  from  Hyde  Park)  "  where 
many  poor  children  were  disporting  happily,  and 
errand  boys  were  playing  at  toss  halfpenny,  and  black 
sheep  were  grazing  in  the  sunshine,  and  an  actor  was 
learning  his  part  on  a  bench,  and  nursery  maids  and 
their  charges  sauntered  here  and  there  ;  "  and  from 
the  Green  Park  "  made  their  way  into  Grosvenor 
Place,  and  to  the  door  of  the  mansion  occupied  there 
by  Sir  Francis  and  Lady  Clavering." 

You  cannot  cross  from  the  Green  Park  to  Hyde 
Park  Corner  without  noticing  Apsley  House,  where 
the  great  Duke  of  Wellington  lived  ;  Thackeray's 
Philip  comes  in  from  Hyde  Park,  and  tells  his  friends 
in  Beaunash  Street,  "  As  I  passed  by  Apsley  House,  I 
saw  the  Duke  come  out,  with  his  old  blue  frock  and 
white  trousers  and  clear  face  ;  "  and  you  see  the  Duke 
somewhere  else  in  Thackeray — I  forget  for  the  moment 
where — riding  from  Apsley  House  down  Piccadilly. 
I  don't  think  nightingales  are  to  be  heard  in  any  of 
the  Parks  now,  but  in  Shirley's  comedy,  Hyde  Park, 
you  have  Mistress  Carol,  catching  at  the  old  super- 
stition   that    it    is    lucky    to    hear    the    nightingale, 


ll[,.;,.,i,£iJii|-;i,,,i, 


'  At  JJ  llntton  linn/rn  vas  thf  nU  fhUicf-rnurl  tirriiiint  mfr  hy  n  Mr.  Lning,  nn  umjtut 
nnii  ititnli-rnnt  iiinf^istrnU  vh,t  vns  thf  originnt  of  ,Mr.  h'nng  In  '  Olixxr  i'u-iil.' 

Chnffttr  ij 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         273 

crying  out  to  Fairfield,  as  they  walk  in  the  Park 
together  : 

Hark^  sir,  the  nightingale  ;  there  is  better  luck 
Coming  towards  us. 

You  have  Lacy,  in  the  same  play,  urging  his  friends  : 
"  Prythee  stay  :  we'll  to  Hyde  Park  together  ;  "  and 
Bonavent  adding,  "  There  you  may  meet  with  morris- 
dancers  " — and  that  too  has  become  a  thing  of  the 
past,  but  "  Hyde  Park  has  still  something  about  it 
of  Arcadia,"  as  Disraeli  says  in  Tancred,  and  apart 
from  the  extravagance  of  its  flattery  there  is  nothing 
so  out  of  date  in  Lord  Bonvile's  Hyde  Park  greeting 
of  Julietta  : 

Lady^  you  are  welcome  to  the  spring  ;  the  Park 
Looks  fresher  to  salute  you  :   how  the  birds 
On  every  tree  sing  with  more  cheerfulness 
At  your  access. 

For  how  many  centuries  it  has  been  the  mode  for 
society  to  take  the  air  in  Rotten  Row  I  do  not  know  ; 
but  Ben  Jonson's  Fitzdottercl,  in  The  Devil  is  an  Ass, 
prr)poses  to  buy  u  gilt  coach  that  his  wife  and  her 
lover  may  ride  together  iji  it  into  Hyde  Park  ;  and 
Randolph  writes  of  Madame  Lcsbia  who  lavished 
money  on  a  favourite  young  actor,  so  that  he 

May  scatter  angels,  rub  out  silks,  and  shine 
In  cloths  of  gold  ;  cry  loud,  '  The  world   is  mini-  :  ' 
Keep  his  race-nags,  and  in  Hyde  Park  be  seen 
Brisk  a.s  the  best. 

Mr.  Foker,  of  Pcndennis,  brooding  over  his  vain  love 
for  Blanche  Amory,  "  cantered  away  down  Rotten 
Row,    his    mind     agitated    witli     various    emotions, 


274  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

ambitions,  mortifications,"  and  nearly  ran  into  the 
roomy  carriage  of  his  Aunt  Lady  Rosherville,  and 
in  it  with  his  aunt  was  the  Lady  Ann,  to  whom  he 
was  betrothed.  George  Warrington,  in  The  Virginians, 
displeased  his  family  by  his  marriage,  and  "  walking 
shortly  afterwards  in  Hyde  Park  with  my  dearest 
companion,"  he  says,  "  I  met  my  little  cousin  exer- 
cising on  horseback  with  a  groom  behind  him  ;  "  and 
in  defiance  of  orders,  the  little  Miles  Warrington  pulled 
up  to  speak  with  his  cousin  and  to  admire  the  pretti- 
ness  of  his  cousin's  wife.  To  be  seen  riding  or  driving 
in  Rotten  Row  has  been  the  hall-mark  of  social 
superiority  since  long  before  you  and  I  were  born  ; 
and  when  Mr.  Gudge  and  his  wife,  in  Christopher 
Tadpole,  had  risen  in  the  world  and  went  driving  in 
Hyde  Park,  they  were  only  doing  what  is  commonly 
done  by  those  who  rise  : 

"  There  were  all  sorts  of  vehicles  that  afternoon  in  the  Park. 
Heavy  old  family  coaches,  with  coachmen  and  horses  to  match, 
and  the  most  wonderful  old  ladies  inside  that  ever  were  seen — 
equipages  that  crept  out  year  after  year  with  their  panels 
revarnished  and  their  brass-work  relacquered  .  .  .  new 
barouches,  blazing  with  escutcheons  Hke  theatrical  banners, 
and  liveries  almost  like  the  harlequins',  just  started  by  parvenus 
living  on  the  borders  of  the  exclusive  world  and  constantly 
fighting  to  pass  its  frontier  ;  mail-phaetons  driven  by  men 
about  town,  who  had  gone  round  and  round  the  Park  for  thirty 
years  and  still  clung  to  the  peculiar  hats,  cravats  and  general 
demeanour  that  distinguished  them  when  they  commenced 
their  career.  .  .  .  There  were  broughdams  too,  with  Winds 
half  down  and  small  dogs  looking  out  of  the  window  ;  within 
which  might  be  seen  faces  once  fair  and  still  with  sufficient 
beauty  to  attract  attention." 

The  style  of  carriage  has  altered ;   there  are  motor- 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         275 

cars  among  them  ;  and  those  who  ride  in  them  or  on 
horseback  have  changed  the  fashion  of  their  garments  ; 
otherwise,  the  same  stream  flows  by  in  the  road,  with 
the  same  types  of  young  bloods  and  old  dandies 
walking  on  the  footpath,  or  lolling  on  the  railings, 
day  after  day  through  the  season,  and  there  is  always 
some  social  climber  flowing  m  the  stream  who  gazes 
on  the  gorgeous  pageant  from  inside  something  finer 
than  the  hired  carriage  that  satisfied  Albert  Smith's  Mr. 
Gudge  and  says  in  his  heart,  as  Mr.  Gudge  said  aloud  to 
his  wife,  "  Well,  there's  a  comfort  in  mixing  with  the 
nobs,  anyhow,  though  you  ain't  one  of  'em  by  birth." 
Pendennis,  in  The  Newcomes,  came  upon  Fred 
Bayham  in  Hyde  Park,  "  toying  affably  with  a  nursery 
maid  who  stood  with  some  of  her  little  charges 
watching  the  yachts  upon  the  Serpentine,"  which 
parts  Hyde  Park  from  Kensington  Gardens  ;  but  no 
writer  has  used  the  Serpentine  more  effectively  than 
it  is  used  by  Besant,  in  The  Seamy  Side.  Anthony 
Hamblin,  harrassed  by  financial  difficulties  and 
threatened  with  a  certain  exposure  and  disgrace,  goes 
one  evening  to  skate  on  the  Serpentine.  He  gives  his 
overcoat  into  the  care  of  one  of  the  Royal  Humane 
Society's  officers,  and  is  standing  at  the  edge  of  the 
ice,  brooding  heavily  and  about  to  fasten  on  liis 
skates,  when  a  sudden  noise  startles  him.  He  glajiccs 
up,  and  "  where  the  people  had  been  crowded,  skating 
and  running,  Anthony  ga/x-d  upon  a  great  open  space, 
in  which  a  hundred  and  fifty  people  were  struggling 
in  the  water  among  the  bn^ken  blocks  of  ice  for  very 
life,  amid  the  shrieks  and  cries  of  spectators  helpless 
to  do  anything."  In  a  flash,  he  sees  a  way  out  of 
his   troubles.     Unnoted   in   the  general   hubbub   and 


276  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

excitement,  he  slips  quietly  away  and  disappears  ; 
his  coat  remains  unclaimed,  and  that  night  his  name 
appears  in  the  newspaper  lists  of  those  who  had 
perished  in  the  ice-accident. 

With  no  more  than  a  glance  at  Kensington  Gardens, 
that  is  haunted  by  Leigh  Hunt,  Nathaniel  Hawthorne, 
Thackeray,  and  his  characters,  and  by  Matthew 
Arnold,  who  mused  and  wrote  one  of  his  poems  in 
them  ;  we  shall  take  a  turn  up  Piccadilly,  before  we 
negotiate  Park  Lane  on  our  road  back  to  the  City 
and  the  end  of  our  tour.  Piccadilly  always  reminds 
me  at  once  of  Laurence  Oliphant's  clever  satirical 
novel  that  was  named  after  it  ;  there  is  a  subtle  sug- 
gestion of  the  world,  the  flesh  and  the  devil,  and  all 
the  good  things  of  life  that  are  so  bad  for  us,  in  its 
very  name.  It  is  a  street  of  riches  and  beauty  and 
pleasure  ;  it  knows  nothing  of  the  sordid  miseries 
that  are  vulgarly  obtruded  upon  us  in  poorer,  com- 
moner thoroughfares  ;  or  if  it  does  it  is  well-bred 
enough  to  conceal  the  fact.  The  Green  Park  makes 
a  pleasaunce  along  one  side  of  it,  half  the  length  of 
its  way  ;  all  behind  the  other  side  of  it  lies  Mayfair, 
inhabited,  not  only  in  Thackeray's  and  Disraeli's 
novels,  but  in  reality,  by  those  happy  ones  who  toil 
not  neither  do  they  spin  ;  in  its  byways,  or  just 
beyond  it  in  Pall  Mall,  are  all  the  most  expen- 
sive and  exclusive  Clubs  in  London,  and  some 
of  the  most  magnificent  hotels.  Once  you  grow 
sensitive  to  London's  varying  atmospheres  and 
moods  and  can  readily  subserviate  your  own  to 
them  in  your  walks  abroad,  you  wUl  sympathise 
with  Locker-Lampson's  gay  eulogy  of  this  happiest 
of  streets  : 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         277 

Piccadilly  ! — shops,  palaces,  bustle  and  breeze, 
The  whirling  of  wheels,  and  the  murmur  of  trees, 
By  night,  or  by  day,  whether  noisy  or  stilly, 
Whatever  my  mood  is — I  love  Piccadilly  ! 

Clarges  Street,  in  which  Warrington's  stately  aunt 
Lambert  had  her  address,  conducts  yon  to  Curzon 
Street,  which  still  retains  intact  the  Ciirzon  Street 
Chapel  that  appears  in  The  Neivcomes  as  "  that 
elegant  and  commodious  chapel,  known  as  Lady 
Whittlesea's."  The  Rev.  Charles  Honeyman  "  ven- 
tured his  little  all  "  on  securing  a  lease  of  it.  Rank 
and  fashion  flocked  to  it  then,  as  they  flock  to  it  now, 
and  Thackeray  lets  you  overhear  Lord  Dozcley  and 
his  wife,  coming  away  one  Sunday  evening  among  the 
crowd  who  have  been  to  the  ser\'icc,  discuss  Mr. 
Honeyman  and  his  prospects.  Says  my  Lord,  "He 
can't  make  less  than  a  thousand  a  year  out  of  his 
chapel.  ...  A  thousand  a  year,  besides  the  rent  of 
the  wine-vaults  below  the  chapel."  "  Don't,  Charles," 
says  his  wife,  with  a  solemn  look.  "  Don't  ridicule 
things  in  that  way."  "  Confound  it  !  there  arc  wine- 
vaults  under  the  chnpel,"  answers  downright  Charles. 
"  It's  better  to  sit  over  vaults  with  wine  in  thcni  than 
coffins."  When  Honeyman  fell  into  debt,  Mr  Shcrrick, 
who  was  his  landlord  and  ran  the  wine-vaults,  had 
him  arrested  and  confined  in  Mr.  Moss's  spunging- 
house  in  Cursitor  Street,  Chancery  Lane,  from  whicii 
he  emerged  triumphnntly  to  resume  his  ministrations 
at  the  Chapol  with  mr)rp  eclat  than  ever. 

WTien  Rawdon  Crawley  married  P.rc  ky  Sharp,  in 
Vanity  Fair,  they  set  up  their  establishmrnt  in  Curzon 
Street,  in  a  furnished  honsr  of  whic  li  Mr.  Ruggles,  the 
ex-butler,    was    landlord.     Here    Sir     Pitt     Crawley 


278  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

stayed  with  them,  whilst  his  own  dismal  house  in 
Great  Gaunt  Street  (otherwise  Berkeley  Street)  was 
being  renovated,  and  on  an  important  occasion,  he 
descended  the  steps,  "  in  a  glittering  uniform,  his 
sword  between  his  legs,"  and  with  Rawdon  and  Becky 
was  driven  away  to  join  "  the  line  of  equipages  which 
was  making  its  way  down  Piccadilly  and  St.  James's 
Street  towards  the  old  brick  Palace,"  where  Becky 
was  to  be  presented  by  him  at  Court.  It  was  the 
splendid  parties  Becky  gave  here  that  helped  to 
plunge  Rawdon  into  debt,  but  the  house  is  chiefly 
memorable  as  the  scene  of  one  of  the  greatest  incidents 
in  all  Thackeray's  books.  We  have  seen  Rawdon 
arrested  in  the  street  and  borne  off  to  the  Cursitor 
Street  spunging-house  ;  when  by  the  efforts  of  some 
of  his  friends,  he  was  set  at  liberty,  he  came  back  to 
Curzon  Street  that  night  to  see  his  drawing-room 
windows  blazing  with  light.  Letting  himself  in,  he 
heard  laughter  in  the  upper  rooms  ;  Becky  was  singing, 
and  it  was  Lord  Steyne's  voice  that  rose  in  applause. 

"  Rawdon  opened  the  door  and  went  in.  A  little  table  with 
a  dinner  was  laid  out — and  wine  and  plate.  Steyne  was  hang- 
ing over  the  sofa  on  which  Becky  sate.  ...  He  had  her  hand 
in  his,  and  was  bowing  over  it  to  kiss  it,  when  Becky  started 
up  with  a  faint  scream  as  she  caught  sight  of  Rawdon's  white 
face.  At  the  next  instant  she  tried  to  smile,  a  horrid  smile, 
as  if  to  welcome  her  husband  ;  and  Steyne  rose  up,  grinding 
his  teeth,  pale,  and  with  fury  in  his  looks.  He,  too,  attempted 
a  laugh — and  came  forward  holding  out  his  hand.  '  What, 
come  back  !  How  d'ye  do,  Crawley  ?  '  he  said,  the  nerves  of 
his  mouth  twitching  as  he  tried  to  grin  at  the  intruder. 

"  There  was  that  in  Rawdon's  face  which  caused  Becky  to 
fling  herself  before  him.  '  I  am  innocent,  Rawdon,'  she  said, 
'  before  God,  I  am  innocent.'     She  clung  hold  of  his  coat,  of 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         279 

his  hands  ;  her  owm  were  all  covered  with  serpents,  and  rings 
and  baubles.  '  I  am  innocent. — Say  I  am  innocent,'  she  said 
to  Lord  Steyne. 

"  He  thought  a  trap  had  been  laid  for  him,  and  was  as  furious 
with  the  ^vife  as  with  the  husband.  '  You  innocent  !  Damn 
you,'  he  screamed  out.  '  You  innocent  !  Why  every  trinket 
you  have  on  your  body  is  paid  for  by  me.  I  have  given  you 
thousands  of  pounds  which  this  fellow  has  spent,  and  for  which 
he  has  sold  you.  Innocent,  by —  !  .  .  .  Don't  think  to 
frighten  me  as  you  have  done  others.  Make  way,  sir,  and  let 
me  pass  ; '  and  Lord  Steyne  seized  up  his  hat  and,  with  flame 
in  his  eyes  and  looking  his  enemy  fiercely  in  the  face,  marched 
upon  him,  never  for  a  moment  doubting  that  the  other  would 
give  way.  But  Rawdon  Crawley  springing  out,  seized  him 
by  the  neckcloth,  until  Steyne,  almost  strangled,  writhed  and 
bent  under  his  arm.  '  You  lie,  you  dog  ! '  said  Rawdon. 
'  You  he,  you  coward  and  villain  ! '  And  he  struck  the  Peer 
twice  over  the  face  with  his  open  hand,  and  flung  him  bleeding 
to  the  ground.  It  was  all  done  before  Becky  could  interpose. 
She  stood  there  trembling  before  him.  She  admired  her 
husband,  strong,  brave,  and  victorious. 

"  '  Come  here,'  he  said.— She  came  up  at  once.  '  Take  off 
those  things.'— She  began,  trembling,  pulling  the  jewels  from 
her  arms,  and  the  rings  from  her  shaking  fingers,  and  held 
them  all  in  a  heap,  quivering  and  looking  up  at  him.  '  Throw 
them  down,'  he  said,  and  she  dropped  them.  He  tore  the 
diamond  ornament  out  of  her  breast,  and  flung  it  at  Lord 
Steyne.  It  cut  him  on  his  bald  forehead.  Steyne  wore  the 
scar  to  his  dying  day. 

"'Come  upstairs,'  Rawdon  said  to  his  wife.  '  Dcm't  kill 
me,  Rawdon,'  she  said.  He  laughed  savagely.  '  I  want  to 
see  if  that  man  lies  about  the  money  as  he  has  about  mc.'  " 

While  he  soarrhfd  her  desk  and  boxes  upstairs, 
Steyne  went  home,  and  Rawdon  sent  him  next  morning 
all  the  bank  notes  he  could  fmd,  and  left  Becky  for 
good,  hurt  past  forgiveness  thnt  with  this  money  in 


280  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

her  possession  she  could  have  allowed  him  to  remain 
in  prison  for  debt. 

Lord  Steyne's  town  house  stood  in  Gaunt  Square, 
and  occupied  nearly  the  whole  of  one  side  of  it.  "  The 
remaining  three  sides  are  composed  of  mansions  that 
have  passed  away  into  dowagerism — tall,  dark  houses, 
with  window-frames  of  stone,  or  picked  out  of  a 
lighter  red."  Gaunt  House  is  described  as  having  a 
vast  wall  in  front,  and  rustic  columns  at  the  great 
gate.  It  has  been  identified  by  Mr.  Lewis  Melville 
with  a  house  answering  to  Thackeray's  description 
that  takes  up  nearly  aU  one  side  of  Berkeley  Square  ; 
the  "  Buckley  Square  "  associated  with  the  immortal 
Jeames  Yellowplush  ;  but  Mrs.  E.  T.  Cook  is  con- 
vinced that  the  original  of  Gaunt  House  is  to  be  found 
in  Manchester  Square  :  it  now  houses  the  Wallace 
collection  and  formerl}^  belonged  to  the  Hertford 
family,  and  the  Lord  Hertford  of  his  time  was 
admittedly  the  model  from  which  Lord  Steyne  was 
drawn. 

Mr.  Wharton,  of  Trollope's  Prime  Minister,  lived  in 
Manchester  Square  ;  Gage,  of  Harrison  Ainsworth's 
Spendthrift,  in  Dover  Street  ;  Major  Pendennis  was 
continually  to  and  fro  between  his  rooms  in  Bury 
Street  and  his  Club  in  St.  James's  Street.  Harry 
Esmond,  in  The  Virginians  walked  up  St.  James's 
Street  to  WTiite's  Club  on  the  day  the  King  gave  him 
a  cold  reception  at  St.  James's  Palace.  St.  James's 
Church,  in  Piccadilly,  numbered  Major  Pendennis 
among  its  habitual  worshippers ;  stroUing  along 
Piccadilly,  Harry  Esmond  and  Dick  Steele  came  across 
Addison  poring  over  a  folio  volume  at  the  bookshop 
which  was  near  St.  James's  Church  ;   and  in  the  same 


PICCADILLY  AND  THE  PARKS         281 

Church  Alfred  Lammle,  of  Our  Mutual  Friend,  who 
Hved  in  Sackville  Street,  Piccadilly,  was  married  to 
the  unhappy  Sophronia.  Round  the  comer,  in  the 
same  novel,  that  timorous,  quaint  little  gentleman, 
Twemlow,  lived  in  Duke  Street,  St.  James's,  over  a 
livery  stable,  which  livery  stable  you  may  find 
without  difficulty  up  Mason's  Yard  ;  Warrington  had 
chambers  in  Bond  Street,  where  Sterne  died  ; 
Fascination  Fledgby,  of  Our  Mutual  Friend,  had 
chambers  in  the  Albany,  off  Bond  Street,  where 
Byron,  Lytton,  Macaulay,  and  other  of  the  immortals 
had  chambers  before  him — but  we  will  not  continue 
the  list,  for  there  is  scarcely  a  street  out  of  or  near 
Piccadilly  that  has  not  had  its  famous  residents,  real 
or  imaginary,  and  we  are  not  compiling  a  directory. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

OXFORD   STREET,   HOLBORN   AND   CLERKENWELL 

I  WANT  to  return  along  Piccadilly  and  go  by  Park 
Lane  to  Oxford  Street,  not  because  Barnes  New- 
come  lived  in  Park  Lane  and  Clive  and  the  old  Major 
were  so  often  knocking  at  his  door  ;  nor  because  Miss 
Crawley,  in  Vanity  Fair,  had  "  an  exceedingly  snug 
and  well-appointed  house  in  Park  Lane,"  where 
Becky  Sharp  stayed  with  her  ;  but  because  when 
you  come  out  by  Marble  Arch,  at  the  Oxford  Street 
end  of  that  Lane,  if  you  look  across  to  the  comer 
where  Edgware  Road  joins  Bayswater  Road  you  are 
looking  at  the  site  of  the  gallows  that  stood  at  Tyburn, 
from  the  twelfth  until  near  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  A  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  it  was  still 
a  common  enough  thing  to  see  that  grisly  procession 
coming  up  Holborn  and  Oxford  Street  to  the  corner 
yonder  :  the  condemned  wretch  in  the  cart,  with  the 
hangman,  his  coffin  and  the  chaplain,  and  a  noisy, 
holiday  mob  preceding  and  following  to  swell  the 
crowd  already  awaiting  them  at  Tyburn.  Jack 
Sheppard  came  that  shameful  pilgrim  way  to  death, 
and  Dick  Turpin,  Sixteen-String  Jack,  and  many 
another  soiled  knight  of  the  road,  as  you  will  know  if 
you  have  read  Ainsworth's  and  other  romances  of 
them  ;  and  the  pages  of  London's  history  are  dark 
with  similar  records  of  poor,  less  glamorous  wretches, 

282 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.      283 

and  of  simple  or  gallant  gentlemen  who  were  more 
unlucky  than  criminal. 

Oxford  Street  is  part  of  the  great  road  that  the 
Romans  built  from  Watling  Street  in  the  city,  out 
along  Edgware  Road  and  away  into  the  North  ;  but 
its  chief  human  interest  for  us  is  that  its  stony  pave- 
ments were  trodden  night  after  night  by  De  Quincey 
in  those  hungry  weeks  when  he  was  homeless  in 
London  and  saved  from  death  by  the  charity  of  a 
poor  street-walker.  In  Welbeck  Street,  which  turns 
out  of  Oxford  Street  on  our  left,  is  the  house  of  Lord 
George  Gordon,  of  Barnahy  Rudge  ;  and  round  Regent 
Street,  also  to  the  left,  is  the  Langham  Hotel,  where 
the  millionaire  of  Besant  and  Rice's  Golden  Butterfly, 
gave  his  famous  sensational  banquet.  A  little  past 
Regent  Street  on  the  right  was  the  Pantheon,  to  which 
Fanny  Burney's  Evelina  went  with  Captain,  Mrs.  and 
Miss  Mirvan,  and  had  a  momentous  meeting  with 
Lord  Orville.  There  is  a  Pantheon  now  on  the  same 
spot,  built  somewhat  on  the  lines  of  the  old  one  ;  it 
is  no  longer,  however,  a  dancing  and  pleasure  place 
to  which  the  rank  and  fashion  of  the  town  resort,  but 
is  concerned  with  the  bottled-bcer  industry. 

All  on  our  right,  between  this  and  Charing  Cross 
Road,  are  streets  that  nm  into  the  storied  region  of 
Soho.  Argyll  Street  will  take  you  through  Carnaby 
Street  to  Golden  Square  where  Ralph  Nickleby  lived 
with  Newman  Noggs  for  his  clerk,  and  in  Golden 
Square,  too,  lived  the  Kenwigs'  family,  with  whf)m 
Newman  lodged.  Young  Moss,  in  The  Newcomcs,  had 
a  father  "  who  does  bills  and  keeps  a  bric-a-brac 
shop  in  Wardour  Street  ;  "  the  shade  of  Thackeray  is 
all  about  the  district  :    "  I   like  to  walk  among   the 


284  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Hebrews  of  Wardour  Street,"  he  says  in  Philip,  "  and 
fancy  the  place,  as  it  once  was,  crowded  with  chairs 
and  gilt  chariots,  and  torches  flashing  in  the  hands  of 
running  footmen.  I  have  a  grim  pleasure  in  thinking 
that  Golden  Square  was  once  the  resort  of  the  aris- 
tocracy, and  Monmouth  Street  the  delight  of  the  genteel 
world.  ...  As  the  late  Mr.  Gibbon  meditated  his 
history  leaning  against  a  column  in  the  Capitol,  why 
should  I  not  muse  over  mine,  reclining  under  an  arcade 
of  the  Pantheon  ?  Not  the  Pantheon  at  Rome,  in 
the  Cabbage  Market  by  the  Piazza  Navona,  where  the 
immortal  gods  were  worshipped — the  immortal  gods 
who  are  now  dead  ;  but  the  Pantheon  in  Oxford 
Street,  ladies,  where  you  purchase  feeble  pomatums, 
music,  glassware,  and  baby-linen  ;  and  which  has  its 
history  too.  Have  not  Selwyn,  and  Walpole,  and 
March,  and  Carlisle  figured  there  ?  Has  not  Prince 
Florizel  flounced  through  the  hall  in  his  rustling 
domino,  and  danced  there  in  powdered  splendour." 
And  now  the  Pantheon  is  not  even  a  bazaar,  and  where 
the  Prince  Regent  danced  beer  is  bottled. 

George  Warrington,  when  he  first  married  Theo,  in 
The  Virginians,  lived  in  Dean  Street,  Soho,  and  wrote 
to  his  wife  years  later,  when  he  was  in  London  without 
her,  recording  "  how  he  had  been  to  look  up  at  the 
windows  of  the  dear  old  house  in  Dean  Street,  and 
wondered  who  was  sitting  in  the  chamber  where  he 
and  Theo  had  been  so  happy."  Luckworth  Crewe 
and  Nancy  Lord,  roaming  on  Jubilee  night,  in  In  the 
Year  of  Jubilee,  tramped  along  Oxford  Street,  and 
had  turned  aside  into  the  same  Soho  byway  when  the 
self-confident  Crewe  remarked,  "  I  know  I  shall  live 
to  be  a  rich  man,  just  as  well  as  I  know  that  I'm 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     285 

walking  down  Dean  Street  with  Miss  Lord."  Lady 
Betty,  in  Tom  Taylor's  Lady  Clancarty,  tells  Lord 
Clancarty,  "  I'm  Lady  Betty  Noel,  at  your  service, 
and  to  be  heard  of  at  my  Lord  Gainsborough's,  in 
Soho  Square,"  but  that  was  in  Soho's  more  fashion- 
able period,  tjiat  Thackeray  moralised  over  ;  and  in 
that  same  period  Jenny  Wilmot,  of  Besant's  Orange 
Girl,  who  had  sold  oranges  outside  Drury  Lane  Theatre 
before  she  became  a  celebrated  actress,  kept  her 
fashionable  Assembly  Rooms  m  Soho  Square,  and  had 
her  windows  blazing  with  light  every  night,  and  her 
chambers  filled  with  masqueradcrs  and  card-playing 
parties.  Mr.  Jaggers,  of  A  Talc  of  Two  Cities,  lived 
in  Gerrard  Street,  Soho,  in  "  a  house  on  the  south 
side  of  the  street,  rather  a  stately  house  of  its  kind  ;  " 
and  Manette  Street  sufficiently  indicates  the  position 
once  occupied  by  "  the  quiet  lodgings  of  Doctor 
Manette,"  of  A  Tale  of  Two  Cities,  "  in  a  street  comer 
not  far  from  Soho  Square  " — that  wonderful  corner 
for  echoes  where  Lucie  Manette  sat  "  listening  to  the 
echoing  footsteps  of  the  years,"  and  round  wliich 
revolved  so  much  of  the  tragedy  of  Sydney  Carton's 
life  and  death. 

A  few  paces  down  the  High  Street,  between  Charing 
Cross  Road  and  New  O.xford  Street,  is  the  church  of 
St.  Giles,  past  which  Dickens  went  one  night,  with 
Inspector  Field,  cLS  its  dork  was  striking  nine,  to  vi^it 
a  filthy  lodging  house,  fdled  with  "  a  dream  of  l^ahful 
faces,"  in  a  street  that  was  fifty  yards  from  the  Police 
Station  here,  and  "  within  call  of  St.  Giles's  Ciinrrh." 
Wedged  in  a  bendby  the  churcii  wall,  in  The  Orange  (,irl, 
"  a  tavern  called  the  Black  Jack  stands  over  ag.iinst 
the  west  front  of  St.  Giles's  Church,  at  the  corner  of 


286  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Denmark  Street,  with  a  double  entrance,  which  has 
proved  useful,  I  believe,  on  the  appearance  of  con- 
stables or  Bow  Street  runners.  The  Church,  which 
is  large  and  handsome,  worthy  of  better  parishioners, 
stands  in  the  midst  of  a  quarter  famous  for  harbouring, 
producing  and  encouraging  the  most  audacious  rogues 
and  the  most  impudent  drabs  that  can  be  found  in 
the  whole  of  London."  You  have  the  character  of 
the  house  in  brief  in  the  frank  confession  made  by 
the  charming  Jenny  Wilmot  to  the  young  Lord  who 
loved  and  wanted  to  marry  her,  and  whom  she  would 
not  marry,  for  his  own  sake  : 

"  This,"  I  told  my  Lord,  "  is  the  Black  Jack  tavern.  It 
is  the  House  of  Call  for  most  of  the  rogues  and  thieves  of  Soho. 
The  Church  is  St  Giles's  Church.  As  for  my  own  interest  in 
the  house,  I  was  born  there :  my  mother  and  sister  still  keep 
the  place  between  them  :  it  is  in  good  repute  among  the  gentry 
who  frequent  it  for  its  kitchen,  where  there  is  always  a  fire  for 
those  who  cook  their  own  suppers,  and  for  the  drinks  which 
are  excellent,  if  not  cheap.  What  is  the  use  of  keeping  cheap 
things  for  thieves  ?  Lightly  got,  lightly  spent.  There  is 
nothing  cheap  at  that  House.  My  mother  enjoys  a  reputation 
for  being  a  Receiver  of  Stolen  Goods — a  reputation  well 
deserved,  as  I  have  reason  to  believe.  The  goods  are  all  stowed 
away  in  a  stone  vault  or  cellar  once  belonging  to  some  kind  of 
house — I  know  not  what." 

The  place  actually  stood  there  until  a  few  years 
ago,  and  this  was  its  actual  reputation.  There  Jenny 
went  one  evening,  taking  Will  Halliday  with  her,  and 
when  they  came  from  the  foul,  heated  atmosphere  of 
the  tavern,  and  the  loose  talk  of  its  drunken,  villainous 
company,  "  Outside  the  tall  white  spire  of  St.  Giles's, 
looked  down  upon  us.  In  the  churchyard  the  white 
tombs  stood  in  peace,  and  overhead  the  moon  sailed 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.      287 

in  splendour.  Jenny  drew  a  long  breath  :  she  caught 
one  of  the  rails  of  the  churchyard  and  looked  in 
curiously."  Here  and  about  the  churchyard  she  had 
played  as  a  child,  and  she  went  away  weeping  that  it 
seemed  so  impossible  for  her  ever  to  forget  the  past 
and  escape  from  its  influence. 

At  the  other  end  of  Charing  Cross  Road,  on  the 
skirts   of  Soho,  lies   Leicester  Square,   the   Leicester 
Fields  in  which  Harry  Esmond  fought  his  fatal  duel 
with  Lord  Mohun  ;    and  one  night  Will  Halliday,  of 
the   Orange  Girl,   had  an   adventure   near  the  same 
spot.     "  My  way  home,"  he  says,  "  lay  through  Dean 
Street  as  far  as  St.  Ann's  Church  :  then  I  passed  across 
Leicester  Fields  into  St.  Martin's  Lane.     All  this  part 
of  the  way  is  greatly  infested  at  night  by  lurking 
footpads  from  the  choice  purlieus  of  Seven  Dials  and 
Soho."     In  Green  Street  he  was  waylaid  and  beaten 
by  hired   bullies  whose  employer,   Mr.    Probus,   was 
anxious  to  have  Halliday  disgraced  and  put  out  of 
the    way ;     bleeding    and    half    unconscious    he    was 
handed  over  to  the  watch,  and  charged  with  robbing 
one   of  his   assailants,  who  posed  as   a  countryman 
whom  the  other  ruffians  had  rescued.       Seven  Dials 
has  been  shorn  of  its  worst  features,  but  a  good  deal 
of  it  is  recognisably  the  same  as  when  Dickens  wrote 
of  it  in  the  Sketches  by  Boz  ;   and  I  have  the  vividcst 
notion  of  the  barber's  shop  of  Monsieur  Morbleu,  in 
one  of  its  grimy  little  streets,  the  scene  of  so  nuich 
that     happened    in    Moncricff's    amusing    and    once 
popular  farce,  Monsieur  Tonson. 

In  Newman  Street,  to  the  nortli  (jf  Oxford  Stnitt, 
Mr.  Turveydrop,  of  Bleak  House,  had  his  dancing 
academy  ;    and  before  we  go  on  along  Oxford  Street 


288  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

into  Holborn,  we  must  make  a  brief  excursion  north, 
up  Tottenham  Court  Road,  which  is  sombrely  aUve 
with  memories  of  Gissing's  New  Grub  Street.  But  it 
swarms,  too,  with  other  memories.  When  Micawber's 
goods  were  sold  up  for  rent,  whilst  Traddles  was 
lodging  with  him,  "  the  broker  carried  off,"  as  Traddles 
explained  to  David  Copperfield,  "  my  little  round 
table  with  the  marble  top,  and  Sophy's  flower-pot  and 
stand,"  articles  that  he  was  cherishing  towards  setting 
up  a  house  of  his  own  when  he  and  Sophy  were 
married.  "  Now  I  have  kept  my  eye  since  on  the 
broker's  shop,"  said  Traddles,  "  which  is  up  at  the 
top  of  Tottenham  Court  Road,  and  at  last,  to-day,  I 
find  them  out  for  sale."  He  was  afraid  to  appear 
personally  in  the  transaction,  lest  the  broker,  know- 
ing of  his  anxiety  to  recover  them,  should  demand 
an  impossible  price,  so  he  and  David  went  and 
waited  round  the  corner  whilst  Mrs.  Barkis  (otherwise 
Peggoty)  entered  the  shop  and  bought  the  property 
back  for  him.  There  was  a  day  when  Warrington,  in 
The  Virginians,  drove  up  Tottenham  Court  Road 
towards  Marylebone,  and  lost  himself  "  in  the  green 
lanes  behind  Mr.  Whitfield's  round  Tabernacle  in 
Tottenham  Road  and  the  fields  in  the  midst  of  which 
Middlesex  Hospital  stood."  Mr.  Whitfield's  Taber- 
nacle is  still  there,  but  it  is  a  new  one  and  no  longer 
round,  and  there  are  no  fields  within  sight  of  it.  Clive, 
in  The  Newcomes,  had  his  studio  in  Howland  Street 
and  bought  bargains,  in  the  way  of  furniture  for  his 
house,  in  Tottenham  Court  Road ;  Clive 's  friend, 
James  Binney  lived  in  Fitzroy  Square  ;  and  for  a  time, 
before  his  marriage  Clive  had  rooms  in  Charlotte 
Street,  which  is  out  of  Fitzroy  Square.     But  the  drab 


Jtcd'-Adeoek. : 


1  'nil  havt  only  la  lingtr  awhiU  In  the  Clfie  lo-dny  lit  rrnliir  htrir  tistittifr/nll)f  dit/nf 
has  tranj/crrcd  the  lijt  nnd  verr  nlmoi/thrrt  »/  it  inlo  Mil  ifort. " 

Chtt^tff  It 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     289 

hues  and  settled  dull  atmosphere  of  this  neighbour- 
hood are  nowhere  so  prevailing  as  in  New  Grub 
Street.  When  Edwin  Reardon  came  to  London  to 
embark  upon  that  literary  career  that  brought  him 
so  much  of  disappointment  and  misery,  he  lived  here 
for  most  of  the  first  four  years.  "  From  a  certain 
point  in  Tottenham  Court  Road  there  is  visible  a 
certain  garret  window  in  a  certain  street  which  runs 
parallel  with  that  thoroughfare  ;  for  the  greater  part 
of  these  four  years  the  garret  in  question  was 
Reardon's  home."  He  used  to  study  in  the  British 
Museum  Reading  Room,  "  the  valley  of  the  shadow 
of  books,"  that  is  to  the  east  of  Tottenham  Court 
Road  ;  in  the  British  Museum  too  worked  Marian 
Yule,  and  Jasper  Milvain,  overtaking  her  in  Totten- 
ham Court  Road,  walked  with  her  as  far  as  Momington 
Crescent,  in  Hampstead  Road,  Camden  Town,  where 
he  lived,  and  whence  she  went  on  by  bus  to  her  father's 
house  near  Regent's  Park.  Gissing  himself,  in  his 
darkest  days,  lived  off  Tottenham  Court  Road,  and 
there,  in  Percy  Street,  lived  that  cheerful  bohcmian 
Albert  Smith. 

If  you  push  northwards  through  Camden  Town, 
St.  Pancras,  Kentish  Town  and  Hampstead,  it  is  all 
haunted  ground.  J3cn  Jonson  puts  most  of  the  scenes 
of  his  Tale  of  a  Tub  in  Kentish  Town  ;  the  rest  are  at 
Tottenham  Court,  St.  Pancras  and  Marylebono  ;  and 
the  whole  of  it  is  thickly  sown  with  local  allusions. 
Heywood,  too,  has  a  scene  of  his  Wise  Woman  of 
Hogsdon  at  Kentish  Town,  outsich*  the  house  <tf  Mother 
Redcap,  another  wise  woman,  who  has  a  noted  tavern 
at  Kentish  Town  named  after  her  to  this  day.  You 
have  a  vision  of  Defoe's  Colonel  Jack  hastening  up 

19 


290  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Tottenham  Court  Road,  which  he  has  entered  out  of 
the  fields,  bent  on  one  of  his  nefarious  enterprises  ; 
and  farther  on,  by  St.  Pancras  Church,  "  Upon  the 
path,  within  the  bank,  on  the  side  of  the  road  going 
towards  Kentish  Town,  two  of  our  gang.  Will  and  one 
of  the  others  met  a  single  gentleman,  walking  apace 
towards  the  town  ;  being  almost  dark.  Will  cried, 
*  Mark,  ho  !  '  which,  it  seems,  was  the  word  at  which 
we  were  all  to  stand  still  at  a  distance,  come  in  if  he 
wanted  help,  and  give  a  signal  if  anything  appeared 
that  was  dangerous.  Will  steps  up  to  the  gentleman, 
stops  him,  and  put  the  question,  that  is,  '  Sir,  your 
money  ?  '  The  gentleman  seeing  he  was  alone, 
struck  at  him  with  his  cane  ;  but  Will,  a  nimble, 
strong  fellow,  flew  in  upon  him,  and,  with  struggling, 
got  him  down  ;  then  he  begged  for  his  life,  Will  having 
told  him  with  an  oath  that  he  would  cut  his  throat," 

At  this  juncture  a  hackney  coach  came  driving 
along,  and  whilst  Will  held  the  gentleman  down  and 
rifled  his  pockets,  the  rest  of  the  gang  attacked  the 
coach,  robbed  the  persons  in  it,  and  then  they  all 
made  off  with  their  booty,  down  Tottenham  Court 
Road,  across  St.  Giles's  and  Piccadilly,  and  into  Hyde 
Park  ;  here  they  robbed  another  coach  between  Hyde 
Park  Gate  and  Knightsbridge,  and  hurrying  on  did 
more  business  of  the  same  kind  in  the  same  night  at 
Chelsea.  In  Somers  Town,  which  adjoins  Camden 
Town,  resided  Mr.  Snawley,  of  Nicholas  Nicklehy,  in  a 
mean  street  "  in  the  second  of  four  little  houses,  one 
story  high,  with  green  shutters,"  and  with  him  Mr. 
Wackford  Squeers  lodged,  when  he  stayed  longer  in 
town  than  usual.  Dickens  himself  lived,  in  his  boy- 
hood, at  Johnson  Street,   Somers  Town,  where  his 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     291 

house  has  been  recently  marked.  In  Little  College 
Street  (now  College  Place),  Camden  Towti,  where  also 
Dickens  himself  lived,  Mr.  Micawber  had  a  house  near 
the  Veterinary  College,  when  Tommy  Traddles  was 
lodging  with  him  and  suffered  from  the  rapacity  of 
the  broker's  man.  Farther  out,  at  Hampstead,  Walter 
Hartwright,  of  Clement's  Inn,  in  Wilkie  CoUins's 
Woman  in  White,  having  arrived  in  his  walk  over 
Hampstead  Heath  at  a  point  "  where  four  roads 
meet — the  road  to  Hampstead,  along  which  I  had 
returned  ;  the  road  to  Finchley  ;  the  road  to  West 
End;  and  the  road  back  to  London;"  (which  is 
clearly  at  the  end  of  Piatt's  Lane)  had  turned  London- 
wards  about  one  o'clock  in  the  morning  when  he  felt 
a  hand  laid  on  his  shoulder  from  behind  and  started 
round  to  face  "  a  solitary  woman,  dressed  from  head 
to  foot  in  white  garments."  At  Jack  Straw's  Castle, 
on  the  Heath,  where  Dickens  often  dined,  Fred 
Bayham,  in  The  Newcomes,  went  to  have  a  chop,  witli 
his  poor  friend  Kitely  ;  and  on  the  verge  of  the  Heath, 
towards  Highgate,  Mrs.  Bardcll,  of  Pickwick,  went 
with  Master  Bardell  and  a  party  of  friends  to  take  the 
air  and  have  refreshment  in  the  pleasant  tea-garden  of 
The  Spaniards. 

Continuing  up  O.xford  Street,  from  Tottenham  Court 
Road,  you  come  to  Hart  Street,  where  young  George 
Osbom  was  a  day  boy  at  the  school  of  the  Kcv. 
Lawrence  Veal,  and  Josh  and  M.ijor  Dobbin  arrived 
at  the  door  in  a  carriage  one  day  to  see  him  ;  and  the 
opening  scene  of  Monsieur  Tonson  happens  out  of 
doors  in  "  Hart  Street,  Blof)msbury."  Tlic  first 
turning  to  the  left  in  Hart  Street  takes  you  to  the 
British   Museum,   in   and  out   of  which   went    those 


292  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

people  of  Gissing's  New  Grub  Street,  and  into  which 
Bob  Hewett  took  Clem  Peckover,  in  The  Nether  World, 
because  years  ago  his  father  had  once  taken  him  there 
on  a  public  holiday.  Egremont,  of  Thyrza,  had  his 
permanent  lodgings  in  Great  Russell  Street,  which  is 
the  street  of  the  Museum,  where  he  was  frequently 
busy  with  research  work  ;  and  Gilbert  Grail  came 
haunting  those  Great  Russell  Street  rooms,  when 
Thyrza  had  vanished  and  Egremont  was  absent,  and 
he  suspected  the  two  had  gone  away  together.  Past 
the  Museum,  Bloomsbury  Square  lies  to  the  right  of 
you  and  Russell  Square  on  your  left.  In  Bloomsbury 
Square  was  Lord  Mansfield's  house,  that  was  burned 
down  by  the  Gordon  rioters  in  Barnahy  Rudge  ;  a 
crime  for  which  the  law  hanged  some  of  the  rioters 
here  in  the  Square.  John  Sedley,  of  Vanity  Fair, 
had  his  house  in  Russell  Square  ;  here  Amelia  lived 
and  from  here  was  married  to  George  Osborn. 
Osborn's  father  had  his  house  also  in  the  Square,  and 
after  old  Sedley  was  ruined  and  sold  up,  and  had 
removed  to  Fulham,  after  George  Osborn  had  died 
at  Waterloo,  and  Amelia,  left  very  poor  and  never 
yet  acknowledged  by  her  husband's  family,  had  con- 
sented to  let  her  little  son  be  brought  up  by  his  wealthy 
grandfather,  there  were  days  when  she  yearned  to  see 
the  child,  and  then — "  she  takes  a  long  walk  into 
London — yes,  as  far  as  Russell  Square,  and  rests  on 
the  stone  by  the  railing  of  the  garden  opposite  Mr. 
Osborne's  house,  ,  .  .  She  can  look  up  and  see  the 
drawing-room  window  illuminated,  and  at  about  nine 
o'clock,  the  chamber  in  the  upper  story  where  Georgy 
sleeps."  One  Sunday,  going  so,  she  saw  him  come 
across  the  Square  with  his  aunt  and  the  footman  on 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     293 

the  way  to  church,  and  followed  them,  "  until  she 
came  to  the  Foundling  Church,  into  which  she  went. 
There  she  sat  in  a  place  whence  she  could  see  the 
head  of  the  boy  under  his  father's  tombstone.  Many 
hundred  fresh  children's  voices  rose  up  there  and 
sang  hymns  to  the  Father  Beneficent  and  ...  his 
mother  could  not  see  him  for  awhile,  through  the 
mist  that  dimmed  her  eyes." 

The  Foundling  Church  is  part  of  the  Foundling 
Hospital,  which  is  in  Great  Coram  Street,  and  the 
name  of  it  is  inseparably  linked  with  the  story  of 
Little  Dorrit,  where  Mr.  Meagles  explains  to  Clennam 
how  it  was  he  and  Mrs.  Meagles  came  to  adopt 
Tattycoram  as  a  maid  for  their  daughter  : 

"  One  day,  five  or  six  years  ago  now,  when  we  took  Pet 
to  church  at  the  Foundling — you  have  heard  of  the  Foundling 
Hospital  in  London  ?  Similar  to  the  Institution  for  the 
Found  Children  in  Paris  ?  " 

"  I  have  seen  it." 

"  Well  !  One  day  when  we  took  Pet  to  churc  h  there  to 
hear  the  music — because,  as  practical  people,  it  is  the  business 
of  our  lives  to  show  her  everything  that  we  think  can  please 
her — Mother  (my  usual  name  for  Mrs.  Meagles)  began  to  cry 
so,  that  it  was  nece.s.sary  to  take  her  out.  '  What's  the 
matter,  Mother  ?  '  said  I,  when  wc  had  brought  her  a  little 
round,  *  you  are  frightening  Pet,  my  dear.'  '  \'es,  I  know  that, 
Father,'  says  Mother,  '  but  I  think  it's  through  my  loving  her 
so  much  that  it  ever  came  into  my  head.'  '  I'hat  ever  what 
came  into  your  head,  Mother  ?  '  '  O,  dear,  dear  ! '  <  ricd 
Mother,  breaking  out  afresh,  '  when  I  saw  all  those  children 
ranged  tier  above  tier,  and  appealing  from  the  father  none 
of  them  has  ever  known  on  earth,  to  the  great  Father  of  us 
all  in  Heaven,  I  thought  dors  any  wretrhed  mother  ever  rome 
here  and  look  among  those  yf)ung  faces,  wondering  which  is 
the  poor  child  she  brought  into  this  forlorn  world,  never  through 


294  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

all  its  life  to  know  her  love,  her  kiss,  her  face,  her  voice,  even 
her  name  ! '  Now,  that  was  practical  in  Mother,  and  I  told 
her  so.  I  said,  '  Mother,  that's  what  I  call  practical  in  you,  my 
dear.'  ...  So  I  said  next  day  :  Now,  Mother,  I  have  a  pro- 
position to  make  which  I  think  you'll  approve  of.  Let  us  take 
one  of  those  same  children  to  be  a  little  maid  to  Pet.  .  .  .  And 
that's  the  way  we  came  by  Tattycoram." 

Returning  through  Russell  Square  and  Bloomsbury 
Square,  down  Southampton  Row,  where  George  War- 
rington had  one  of  his  various  London  lodgings,  we  get 
back  into  Oxford  Street,  just  where  it  joins  Holbom. 
Nearly  facing  Kingsway  until  lately  was  that  notable 
Kingsgate  Street,  in  which  Sairey  Gamp  lodged  over 
the  shop  of  Poll  Sewddlepipes,  but  no  trace  of  it  sur- 
vives ;  passing  Chancery  Lane  on  our  right,  we  come  to 
Gray's  Inn  on  our  left  ;  Justice  Shallow,  in  Henry  IV., 
boasts  that  in  his  wild  youth,  he  had  a  fight  "  with 
Sampson  Stockfish,  a  fruiterer,  behind  Gray's  Inn  ;  " 
but  much  more  recently  ]\Ir.  Pickwick  went  in  by  this 
ancient  archway  many  a  time  on  his  way  to  see  his 
lawyer,  Mr.  Perker,  in  Gray's  Inn  Square.  Mr.  Percy 
Noakes,  of  the  Sketches  by  Boz,  had  chambers  in  the 
same  Square,  and  his  friend,  Mr.  Loggins,  the  solicitor, 
who  went  on  the  steam  excursion  with  him,  had  offices 
in  the  contiguous  Bos  well  Court.  After  his  marriage, 
Traddles  had  a  small  set  of  chambers  in  Holborn 
Court,  Gray's  Inn,  and  when  David  Copperfield  called 
on  him  there,  he  found  him  very  happy,  in  spite  of  the 
overcrowding  occasioned  by  five  of  his  wife's  sisters 
staying  with  them  on  a  visit,  sleeping  three  in  one 
room  and  two  in  another,  whilst  he  and  his  wife  were 
stowed  away  by  night  in  a  very  small  room  in  the 
roof. 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     295 

Gray's  Inn  Road  used  to  be  Gray's  Inn  Lane,  when 
it  was  narrower,  and  Mr.  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  writing  a  few 
years  ago,  says  "  a  person  who  died  some  years  since 
used  to  speak  to  me  of  a  haystack  within  his  recollec- 
tion at  the  bottom  of  Gray's  Inn  Lane  ;  "  which 
reminds  me  of  Mr.  Transfer,  in  Foote's  play,  The 
Minor,  for  running  over  a  list  of  his  possessions 
Transfer  says,  "  Stay,  stay,  then  again,  at  my  country 
house,  the  bottom  of  Gray's  Inn  Lane,  there's  a 
hundred  ton  of  fine  hay,  only  damaged  a  little  last 
winter  for  want  of  thatching."  It  was  down  such  a 
still  somewhat  rural  Gray's  Inn  Lane  that  Fielding's 
Tom  Jones  and  Partridge  came  by  coach  from  St. 
Alban's  on  their  first  journey  to  London,  and  put  up 
at  the  Bull  and  Gate,  which  has  vanished  from  Holborn. 
Straight  across  Holborn  from  the  end  of  Gray's  Inn 
Road,  and  you  pass  under  the  archway  into  Staple 
Inn,  which  stands  as  you  fmd  it  in  Edicin  Drood  : 

"  Behind  the  most  ancient  part  of  Holborn,  London,  where 
certain  gabled  houses  some  centuries  of  age  still  stand  looking 
on  the  public  way,  as  if  disconsolately  looking  for  the  Old 
Bourne  that  has  long  run  dry,  is  a  little  nook  composed  of  two 
irregular  quadrangles,  (ailed  Staple  Inn.  It  is  one  of  those 
nooks,  the  turning  into  which  out  of  the  clashing  street,  imparts 
to  the  relieved  pedestrian  the  sensation  of  having  put  cotton 
in  his  ears  and  velvet  soles  on  his  boots.  It  is  one  of  those 
nooks  where  a  few  smoky  sparrows  twitter  in  smoky  trees,  as 
though  they  called  to  one  another,  '  Let  us  play  at  country,' 
and  where  a  few  feet  of  garden-mould  and  a  few  feet  of  gravel 
enable  them  to  do  that  refreshing  violence  to  their  liny  under- 
standings. Moreover,  it  is  one  (A  those  nooks  that  are  legal 
nooks  ;  and  it  contains  a  little  Hall,  with  a  little  lantern  in  its 
roof.  .  .  .  Neither  wind  nor  sun  favoured  Staple  Inn  one 
December  afternoon  towards  six  o'clock,  when  it  was  filled 


296  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

with  fog,  and  candles  shed  murky  and  blurred  rays  through 
the  windows  of  all  the  then-occupied  sets  of  chambers,  notably 
from  a  set  of  chambers  in  a  corner  house  in  the  little  inner 
quadrangle,  presenting  in  black  and  white  over  its  ugly  portal 
the  mysterious  inscription  : 

P 
J        T 

1747. 

In  which  set  of  chambers,  never  having  troubled  his  head 
about  the  inscription,  unless  to  bethink  himself  at  odd  times 
on  glancing  up  at  it,  that  haply  it  might  mean  Perhaps  John 
Thomas,  or  Perhaps  Joe  Tyler,  sat  Mr.  Grewgious  writing  by  his 
fire." 

For  these  were  the  chambers  of  that  grim,  kindly 
old  lawyer,  and,  with  those  initials  over  their  doorway, 
there  is  no  mistaking  them.  After  the  murder — or 
supposed  murder,  of  Edwin  Drood,  Rosa  came  to 
Grewgious  there,  and  he  took  a  room  for  her  in  the 
hotel  up  Fumival's  Inn  across  the  road  in  Holborn. 
Mr.  Tartar's  chambers  were  also  in  Staple  Inn  ;  and 
to  Staple  Inn,  to  refresh  himself  with  a  sight  of  the 
garden,  Mr.  Snagsby,  the  law  stationer  of  Bleak  House, 
used  to  come  round  from  Took's  Court  for  his  evening's 
airing. 

Traddles,  before  he  was  married,  lived  up  "  benind 
the  parapet  of  a  house  in  Castle  Street,  Holborn," 
which  is  the  next  turning  to  Staple  Inn,  but  has  been 
stupidly  renamed  Furnival  Street.  Thither  David 
Copperfield  went  with  Mr.  Dick  and  found  Traddles 
hard  at  work  in  a  small  room,  among  the  furniture  of 
which  were  the  flower-pot  stand  and  the  little  round 
table  they  had  rescued  from  the  broker's  shop  in 
Tottenham  Court  Road.     Nearly  facing  this  street, 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     297 

across  the  other  side  of  Holbom,  is  Furnival's  Inn 
(all  sadly  modernised),  where  Dickens  lived  when  he 
was  writing  Pickwick,  and  where  John  Westlock,  of 
Martin  Chuzzlewit  was  living  when  Tom  Pinch  set  out 
to  see  him  and  lost  his  way  and  wandered  as  far  as 
the  Monument  before  he  found  it.  Over  the  road 
again  is  Barnard's  Inn,  where  Pip,  of  Great  Expecta- 
tions, had  his  chambers,  and  I  have  always  believed 
that  Dampit,  of  Middleton's  old  comedy,  A  Trick  to 
Catch  the  Old  One,  lived  in  Fetter  Lane  ;  for  one  scene 
of  the  play  is  in  his  house,  and  coming  home  he  re- 
marks on  the  unsavoury  atmosphere  in  his  room  and 
exclaims,  "  Fie  upon't,  what  a  choice  of  stinks  here 
is  !  .  .  .  Foh  !  I  think  they  bum  horns  in  Barnard's 
Inn.  If  ever  I  smelt  such  an  abominable  stink,  usury 
forsake  me  !  "  and  Barnard's  Inn  stretches  immediately 
behind  this  end  of  Fetter  Lane  ;  there  was  another 
entrance  from  Fetter  Lane  into  it  before  it  vas  im- 
proved almost  beyond  recognition. 

Once  more  across  the  road,  almost  fronting  Fetter 
Lane,  is  the  site  -now  occupied  by  a  railway  goods 
office — of  that  Bull  Inn  where  Mr.  Lcwsomc  lay  ill  and 
Mrs.  Gamp  nursed  him  ;  at  Holbom  Circus,  we  diverge 
into  Thavics  Inn,  which,  unlike  most  of  the  Inns,  has 
no  archway  ;  it  had  one  in  its  prime,  biit  is  now  a 
plain,  open  street  with  a  icv>-  old  houses  left  in  it, 
one  of  which  may  very  well  be  the  house  of  Mrs. 
Jellaby,  oi  Bleak  House.  Esther  Summerson  and  llie 
Wards  in  Chancery  were  to  pass  the  night  at  Mrs. 
Jellaby's,  when  they  were;  in  town  f<ir  the  making  of 
that  application  to  the  Lord  (  hanrcllor  for  appoint- 
ing Esther  companion  to  Ada  Clare.  Mr.  (.tippy 
escorted    them    round   from    Old   Square,    and    they 


298  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

arrived  here  to  join  a  crowd  that  was  gathered  before 
the  house,  because,  as  Mr.  Guppy  ascertained,  "  One 
of  the  young  Jellaby's  been  and  got  his  head  through 
the  area  railings  ;  "  and  it  is  only  the  older  houses 
that  have  these. 

Thavies  Inn  branches  from  one  side  of  Holbom 
Circus,  and  Hatton  Garden  from  the  other,  and  the 
house  at  53,  Hatton  Garden  was  the  old  police-court 
presided  over  by  a  Mr.  Laing,  an  unjust  and  intolerant 
magistrate,  who  was  the  original  of  Mr.  Fang  in  Oliver 
Twist ;  you  may  learn  from  Forster  how  Dickens 
contrived  to  be  smuggled  into  that  police-office  one 
morning  in  order  that  he  might  witness  Mr.  Laing's 
habitual  outbreaks  and  model  on  him  the  magistrate 
who  bullied  Oliver.  Next  to  Hatton  Garden  is  Ely 
Place,  the  site  of  Ely  House,  where  Shakespeare  puts 
the  death-scene  of  John  of  Gaunt,  in  Richard  II.,  and 
it  were  glory  enough  for  it  that  it  was  in  this  place 
old  Gaunt  uttered  his  nobly  patriotic  valediction  : 

This  royal  throne  of  kings,  this  seat  of  Mars, 

This  other  Eden,  demi-paradise, 

This  fortress  built  by  Nature  for  herself 

Against  infection  and  the  hand  of  war, 

This  happy  breed  of  men,  this  Httle  world, 

This  precious  stone  set  in  the  silver  sea  .  .  . 

This  blessed  plot,  this  earth,  this  realm,  this  England, 

This  nurse,  this  teeming  womb  of  royal  kings, 

Feared  by  their  breed  and  famous  by  their  birth  .  .  . 

England,  bound  in  with  the  triumphant  sea  .  .  . 

That  England  that  was  wont  to  conquer  others. 

Hath  made  a  shameful  conquest  of  itself. 

Here  was  the  garden  of  the  Bishop  of  Ely's  house  in 
Holbom,  where  Gloucester  had  noticed  good  straw- 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     299 

berries  growing,  and  bade  the  Bishop  send  for  some 
of  them,  in  that  scene  in  the  Tower.  David  Copper- 
field  had  a  note  one  morning,  at  his  rooms  in  Bucking- 
ham Street,  Strand,  from  Agnes  Wickficld,  to  sa}-  she 
was  in  London  and  "  staying  at  the  house  of  papa's 
agent,  Mr.  Waterbrook,  in  Ely  Place,  Holbom,"  and 
thither  went  David  that  day,  and  the  next,  when  he 
sat  down  to  dinner  with  her  and  Uriah  Heep  here, 
and  with  Tommy  Traddles  and  certain  of  Mr.  Water- 
brook's  family  circle,  including,  you  remember, 
Hamlet's  Aunt. 

Ahead  of  us,  from  Holbom  Circus,  nms  Holbom 
Viaduct,  and  over  the  Viaduct  from  Clcrkcnwcll  went 
Bob  Hewett  and  Penelope,  otherwise  Pcnnyloaf, 
Candy,  in  The  Nether  World,  making  for  Holbom 
Viaduct  Station  with  a  crowd  of  similar  youths  and 
maidens  to  spend  the  August  Bank  Holiday  (which 
was  also  Bob's  and  Pennyloaf's  wedding  day)  at  the 
Crystal  Palace.  There  was  trouble  at  the  Palace ; 
Clem  Peckover,  who  was  one  of  the  party,  jealous  of 
Pennyloaf,  had  lured  Bob  Hewett  into  falling  out  with 
her  cavalier  for  the  day.  Jack  Bartlcy,  and  as  they 
were  all  streaming  out  from  Holborn  Viaduct  Station 
that  night,  on  the  road  home,  one  of  Clem's  lot  scinirtcd 
some  dirty  Huid  over  Pennyloaf's  dress  and  spoilt  it. 
Bob  Hewett  was  prompt  to  avenge  her,  but  BartUy 
evading  an  immediate  conflict,  ran  away,  P><)b  in  hot 
pursuit,  and  all  the  otlui-s  streaming  after,  towards 
Clerkenwell  Green.  On  the  way  there,  we  turn  aside 
for  a  moment,  up  Charles  Street,  out  of  I'arringdon 
Street,  as  far  as  Bleeding  Heart  Yard,  where  Daniel 
Doyce,  of  Little  Dorrit,  had  his  factory  ;  where  Plomisli 
hved  in   the   parlour  of  a  large  residence   that   was 


300  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

let  off  to  various  tenants,  and  John  Baptist  Cavaletto, 
came  to  lodge  at  the  top  of  the  same  house.  Landlord 
of  all  the  houses  in  Bleeding  Heart  Yard  was  the 
patriarchal  Mr.  Casby,  and  into  the  yard  periodically 
flitted  Mr.  Banks,  who  collected  his  rents  for  him.  It 
has  been  too  much  knocked  down  and  rebuilt  for  one 
to  make  any  attempt  at  identifying  Doyce's  ware- 
house, or  Plornish's  dwelling,  but  it  is  something 
that  over  this  ground  so  many  of  Dickens's  people 
came  and  went,  and  that  here,  at  last.  Banks  un- 
masked the  Batriarch,  and  in  a  frenzy  of  righteous 
scorn  of  his  hypocrisy,  whipped  out  a  pair  of  scissors 
and  shore  off  his  benevolent  white  hair  and  beard 
and  showed  him  to  his  harried  tenants  for  the  miser- 
able old  rascal  that  he  was. 

Farther  up  Farringdon  Street,  where  it  has  become 
Farringdon  Road,  is  Farringdon  Road  Buildings,  a 
gloomy  pile  of  barrack-like  Workmen's  Dwellings, 
where  John  Hewett,  of  The  Nether  World,  joined  a 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Eagles  in  the  tenancy  of  a  flat  up  on  the 
fifth  story,  after  his  wife's  death.  Across  the  barren 
courtyard  of  the  Buildings,  up  the  stone  steps  to  that 
flat,  went  Hewett,  and  his  younger  children,  Tom  and 
Anne  ;  and  Sidney  Kirkwood,  occasionally,  when  he 
called  to  see  them  ;  and  up  the  steps  to  it  went  Clara 
Hewett  with  her  father,  when  he  fetched  her  home, 
after  her  brief  career  on  the  stage,  where  a  jealous 
rival  actress  had  flung  vitriol  at  the  beauty  of  her  face 
and  made  it  repellently  hideous  : 

"  The  economy  prevailing  in  to-day's  architecture  takes 
good  care  that  no  depressing  circumstances  shall  be  absent 
from  the  dwellings  in  which  the  poor  find  shelter.  What 
terrible  barracks,  those   Farringdon  Road   Buildings  !    Vast 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     301 

sheer  walls,  unbroken  by  even  an  attempt  at  ornament ;  row 
above  row  of  windows  in  the  mud-coloured  surface,  upwards, 
upwards,  lifeless  eyes,  murky  openings  that  tell  of  barrenness, 
disorder,  comfortlessness  within.  ...  An  inner  courtyard, 
asphalted,  swept  clean — looking  up  to  the  sky  as  from  a  prison. 
Acres  of  these  edifices,  the  tinge  of  grime  declaring  the  relative 
dates  of  their  erection  ;  millions  of  tons  of  brute  brick  and 
mortar,  crushing  the  spirit  as  you  gaze.  Barracks,  in  truth  ; 
housing  for  the  army  of  industrialism,  an  army  fighting  with 
itself,  rank  against  rank,  man  against  man,  that  the  survivors 
may  have  whereon  to  feed.  Pass  by  in  the  night,  and  strain 
imagination  to  picture  the  weltering  mass  of  human  weariness, 
of  bestiahty,  of  unmerited  dolour,  of  hopeless  hope,  of  crushed 
surrender,  tumbled  together  within  these  forbidding  walls. 
Clara  hated  the  place  from  her  first  hour  in  it.  It  seemed  to 
her  that  the  air  was  poisoned  with  the  odour  of  an  unclean 
crowd.  The  yells  of  children  at  play  in  the  courtyard  tortured 
her  nerves  ;  the  regular  sounds  on  the  staircase,  day  after 
day  repeated  at  the  same  hours,  incidents  of  the  life  of  poverty, 
irritated  her  sick  brain  and  filled  her  with  despair  to  think 
that  as  long  as  she  lived  she  could  never  hope  to  rise  again 
above  this  world  to  which  she  was  born." 

This  despair  made  her  desperate  and  unscrupulous. 
In  the  days  when  she  had  begun  to  behevi;  she  liad  the 
world  at  her  feet,  she  shghted  Sidney  Kirkwood  and 
rejected  him  ;  now  she  set  herself  to  recapture  him  ; 
her  affliction  appealed  tc;  his  pity  and  his  chivalry  ; 
he  steeled  himself  against  his  love  for  Jane  Snowden 
and  with  a  feeling  that  in  Clara's  extremity,  he  must 
be  tnie  to  his  love  of  the  past,  he  was  easily  lured 
back  to  his  allegiance  to  her.  On  the  night  when 
she  was  planning  in  her  mind  the  interview  at  which 
Kirkwood  was  to  succumb,  slie  stood  looking  frc^m 
her  window  in  Farringdon  Road  Buildings  over  tlie 
innumerable  chimneys  of  the  City  : 


302  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

"  Directly  in  front,  rising  mist-detached  from  the  lower  masses 
of  building,  stood  in  black  majesty  the  dome  of  St  Paul's  ;  its 
vastness  suffered  no  diminution  from  this  high  outlook,  rather 
was  exaggerated  by  the  flying  scraps  of  misty  vapour  which 
softened  its  outline  and  at  times  gave  it  the  appearance  of 
floating  on  a  vague  troubled  sea.  Somewhat  nearer,  amid 
many  spires  and  steeples,  lay  the  surly  bulk  of  Newgate.  .  .  . 
Nearer  again,  the  markets  of  Smithfield,  Bartholomew's 
Hospital,  the  tract  of  modern  deformity,  cleft  by  a  gulf  of 
railway,  which  spreads  between  Clerkenwell  Road  and  Charter- 
house Street.  Down  in  Farringdon  Street  the  carts,  waggons, 
vans,  cabs,  omnibuses,  crossed  and  intermingled  in  a  steaming 
splash-bath  of  mud  ;  human  beings,  reduced  to  their  due 
paltriness,  seemed  to  toil  in  exasperation  along  the  strips  of 
pavement,  bound  on  errands  which  were  a  mockery,  driven 
automaton-like  by  forces  they  neither  understood  nor  could 
resist.  .  .  .  Then  her  eye  fell  upon  the  spire  of  St  James's 
Church,  on  Clerkenwell  Green,  whose  bells  used  to  be  so  familiar 
to  her." 

So  looking  out  over  the  City,  from  her  high  window 
in  this  drab,  bleak,  unhomelike  mass  of  Workmen's 
Dwellings,  brooding  on  the  hopes  of  her  past,  and 
despairing  of  her  future,  Clara  Hewett  resolved  to 
reassert  her  earlier  claim  on  Kirkwood's  love,  and 
went  out,  cloaking  her  marred  face,  and  round  by 
Clerkenwell  Road,  to  St.  John's  Square,  and  sent  a 
boy  into  the  place  where  Kirkwood  was  employed 
with  a  letter  that  brought  him  to  her  that  night,  and 
when  he  left  her  he  had  been  drawn  into  asking  her 
again  to  be  his  wife,  and  she  had  consented. 

From  Clerkenwell  Green  to  Islington,  Gissing  has 
made  all  this  dreary  tract  of  shabby  houses  peculiarly 
his  own.  In  one  of  these  streets  of  Clerkenwell, 
"  towards  that  part  of  its  confines  which  is  nearest 
to   the  Charterhouse,"  Dickens,   in   Barnahy  Rudge, 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     303 

put  the  shop  of  Dolly  Varden's  father,  the  locksmith  ; 
and  "  in  a  narrow  and  a  dirt}^  street,"  somewhere 
among  the  "  working-jeweller  population  taking 
sanctuary  about  the  church  in  Clerkenwell,"  he  put 
the  shop  of  Silas  Wegg's  friend,  Mr.  Venus,  the  taxi- 
dermist, of  Our  Mutual  Friend  ;  on  Clerkenwell  Green 
itself,  the  Artful  Dodger  and  Charley  Bates  picked  the 
pocket  of  old  Mr.  Brownlow,  as  he  stood  reading  at  a 
bookstall,  and  bolted,  leaving  Oliver  Twist  to  be  over- 
taken and  charged  with  their  crime.  But  if  you  have 
read  The  Nether  World  (to  say  nothing  of  The  JJn- 
classed,  whose  Mr.  Abraham  Woodstock  lives  in  St. 
John's  Street  Road)  you  cannot  go  through  Clerken- 
well without  being  conscious  that  you  are  walking  in 
Gissing's  countr}\ 

On  the  very  first  page  of  The  Nether  World,  you  see 
old  Mr.  Snowden  returned  to  England  after  long 
absence  in  Australia,  walk  slowly  across  Clerkenwell 
Green  and  pause  by  the  graveyard  of  St.  James's 
Church,  looking  about  him.  He  had  used  to  live 
near  by,  and  is  here  in  search  of  the  son  he  had  left 
behind  him  : 

"  The  burial  ground  by  which  he  had  paused  was  as  little 
restful  to  the  eye  as  are  most  of  those  discoverable  in  the  by- 
ways of  London.  The  small  trees  that  grew  about  it  shivered 
in  their  leafle.ssness  ;  the  rank  gra.ss  was  wan  under  the  failing 
day  ;  most  of  the  stones  leaned  this  way  or  that,  emblems  of 
neglect  Cthey  were  very  white  at  the  top,  and  darkened  down- 
wards till  the  damp  soil  made  them  bhuk),  and  certain  (ats 
and  dogs  were  prowling  or  sporting  among  the  graves.  .  .  . 
The  old  man  had  fixed  his  eyes  half  ab.scntly  f)n  the  in.s(  ription 
of  a  gravestone  near  him  ;  a  lean  rat  springing  out  between  the 
iron  railings  seemed  to  recall  his  attention,  an<l  with  a  sigh  he 
went  forward  along  the  narrow  street  which  is  called  St  James's 


304  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

Walk,  In  a  few  minutes  he  had  reached  the  end  of  it, 
and  found  himself  facing  a  high  grey-brick  wall,  wherein, 
at  this  point,  was  an  arched  gateway  closed  with  black 
doors." 

Above  this  gateway  was  a  sculptured  human  face 
distraught  with  agony,  and  over  it  was  carved  the 
legend  :  "  Middlesex  House  of  Detention."  This  old 
prison  is  gone,  and  a  County  Council  School  is  in  its 
place  ;  under  the  school  are  still  one  or  two  of  the 
ancient  cells,  used  now  as  lumber  rooms.  Seeing  a 
woman  at  an  open  door,  the  old  man  asked  her  if  she 
knew  anyone  of  the  name  of  Snowden  living  ther'  - 
abouts  ;  she  did  not,  but  recommended  him  to  en- 
quire at  the  public-house  at  the  corner,  and  to  that 
public-house,  which  is  there  unchanged,  he  went, 
with  no  better  success.  He  was  overheard  enquiring 
there  by  a  small  child  who  had  come  in  for  a  jug  of 
beer.  She  was  too  shy  to  say  anything  until  after 
he  was  gone,  and  it  was  through  other  channels  that 
he  eventually  found  her. 

This  small  girl  was  the  daughter  of  Snowden's  son, 
Joseph,  who  had  deserted  her  long  since,  and  she  had 
been  kept  on  by  his  landlady,  Mrs.  Peckover,  and  was 
degenerated  into  the  little  drudge  of  that  lady  and  her 
daughter  Clem,  at  their  house  in  Clerkenwell  Close. 
At  that  time,  Mr.  Hewett,  with  his  consumptive 
second  wife,  her  baby,  and  Clara  and  Bob,  her  step- 
children, lodged  in  the  same  house  ;  and  Kirkwood, 
Hewett's  friend  and  already  in  love  with  Clara,  came 
often  to  it  to  see  them,  and  took  a  sympathetic  interest 
in  the  starveling  little  Jane  who  slaved  and  slept  in 
the  gloomy  basement.  You  have  only  to  linger  a 
while  in  the  Close  to-day  to  realise  how  wonderfully 


'I'  I/,  /, 


.^ijcj^ift-^- 


\-r\ 


^'^_.  W^SHMOus€ Court 

■~~  Jredyjcock. 

I'Miek 


'In  U'ash-/touse  Court  Ihfy  i/i,iv  you  whni  ii  ltn<HlioHnUy  tht  room  in  vi 
Colontl  NctLKoiiie  thxil  nmi  dint." 

Chnf'Ifr  I  J 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.     305 

Gissing  has  transferred  the  life  and  very  atmosphere 
of  it  into  his  story. 

Kirkwood  worked  in  St.  John's  Square,  for  a 
certain  "  H.  Lewis,  Working  Jeweller,"  and  Gissing's 
description  makes  it  an  easy  task  to  identify  the 
place  : 

"  His  workshop  was  in  St.  John's  Square.  Of  all  the  areas  in 
London  thus  defined,  this  Square  of  St.  John  is  probably  the 
most  irregular  in  outline.  It  is  cut  in  two  by  Clerkenwell 
Road,  and  the  buildings  which  compose  it  form  such  a  number 
of  recesses,  of  abortive  streets,  of  shadowed  alleys,  that  from 
no  point  of  the  Square  can  anything  like  a  general  view  of  its 
totality  be  obtained.  The  exit  from  it  on  the  south  side  is  by 
St.  John's  Lane,  at  the  entrance  to  which  stands  a  survival 
from  a  buried  world — the  embattled  and  windowed  archway 
which  is  all  that  remains  above  ground  of  the  great  Priory  of 
St.  John  of  Jerusalem.  Here  dwelt  the  Knights  Hospitallers, 
in  days  when  Clerkenwell  was  a  rural  parish,  distant  by  a  long 
stretch  of  green  country  from  the  walls  of  London.  But  other 
and  nearer  memories  are  revived  by  St.  John's  Arch.  In  the 
rooms  above  the  gateway  dwelt,  a  hundred  and  fifty  years 
ago,  one  Edward  Cave,  publisher  of  the  Gentleman's  Magazine, 
and  there  many  a  time  sat  a  journeyman  author  of  his,  by 
name  Samuel  Johnson,  too  often  impransus.  There  it  was 
that  the  said  Samuel  once  had  his  dinner  handed  to  him  behind 
a  screen,  because  of  his  unpresentable  costume,  when  (!avc 
was  entertaining  an  aristocratic  guest.  ...  St.  John's  Arch 
had  a  place  in  Sidney  Kirkwood '.s  earliest  memories.  From 
the  window  of  his  present  workshop  he  could  see  its  grey 
battlements." 

And  when  ho  was  a  boy  he  lived  witli  liis  father 
who  "  occupied  part  of  a  house  in  St.  Jolin's  Lane, 
not  thirty  yards  from  the  Arch  :  he  was  a  printer's 
roller  maker,  and  did  but  an  indifferent  business." 
Throughout  most  of  the  Ndhcr  WurU,  Kirkwood  now 
20 


306  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

has  his  lodgings  in  Tysoe  Street,  a  dismal  street,  with 
a  shop  or  two  in  it  and  a  few  old,  faded  houses,  five 
minutes  north  of  the  Green,  out  of  Exmouth  Street 
(down  which  Oliver  Twist  came  when  he  first  entered 
London  with  the  Artful  Dodger),  but  in  the  latter 
stages  of  the  story  he  had  removed  to  Red  Lion 
Street,  which  is  next  to  St.  John's  Lane,  in  the 
Clerkenwell  Road.  Old  Snowden,  in  his  young 
married  days,  lived  in  Hill  Street ;  behind  the  School 
which  has  replaced  the  House  of  Detention  at  the 
top  of  St.  James's  Walk,  is  Rosoman  Street,  a  long, 
unlovely  street  in  one  of  whose  public-houses  Jack 
Bartley  met  the  man  who  induced  him  and  Bob 
Hewett  to  embark  on  a  disastrous  coining  enterprise  ; 
and  in  Merlin  Place,  near  Rosoman  Street,  Bob  and 
Pennyloaf  lived  after  they  were  married.  It  was  by 
St.  James's  Church  that  Jack  Bartley  made  a  stand 
on  that  August  Bank-Holiday  night  when  the  riotous 
party  returned  from  the  Crystal  Palace,  and  by  the 
time  two  policemen  came  and  separated  them.  Bob 
was  torn  and  bleeding,  and  Pennyloaf's  wedding-dress 
was  in  rags  from  the  furious  mauling  of  the  jealous 
Clem  Peckover.  Clerkenwell  Green,  with  Radical 
and  Socialist  speakers  haranguing  crowds  on  it  of  a 
Sunday,  and  this  old  church  of  St.  James  stand  in 
the  heart  of  the  Nether  World ;  nearly  all  its  people 
lived  within  sight  of  the  church  spire  and  within  sound 
of  its  bells  ;  but  one  incident  that  remains  curiously 
clear  in  my  recollection  happened  in  Myddleton 
Passage,  where  Bob  Hewett  asked  Pennyloaf  to  meet 
him  in  the  early  days  of  his  wooing.  Myddleton 
Passage  is  up  the  northern  end  of  St.  John's  Street 
Road,  across  Rosebery  Avenue,  and  behind  Sadler's 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.      307 

Wells    Theatre,    and    it    is    now    as    when    Gissing 
etched  it : 

"  It  is  a  narrow  paved  walk  between  brick  walls  seven  feet 
high  ;  on  the  one  hand  lies  the  New  River  Head,  on  the  other 
are  small  gardens  behind  Myddleton  Square.  The  branches 
of  a  few  trees  hang  over ;  there  are  doors,  seemingly  never 
opened,  belonging  one  to  each  garden  ;  a  couple  of  gas  lamps 
shed  feeble  light.  Pennyloaf  paced  the  length  of  the  Passage 
several  times,  meeting  no  one.  Then  a  policeman  came  along 
with  echoing  tread,  and  eyed  her  suspiciously.  She  had  to 
wait  more  than  a  quarter  of  an  hour  before  Bob  Hewett 
made  his  appearance.  Greeting  her  with  a  nod  and  a  laugh, 
he  took  up  a  leaning  position  against  the  wall,  and  began 
to  put  questions  concerning  the  state  of  things  at  her 
home." 

Presently  he  enquired  if  Pennyloaf  had  seen  any- 
thing of  Clem,  and  confessed  that  she  had  "  got  her 
back  up  "  a  bit  about  them  ;  and  just  then  "  a  man's 
figure  appeared  at  a  little  distance,  and  almost 
immediately  withdrew  again  round  a  winding  of  the 
Passage."  Bob  suspected  it  was  Jack  Bartlcy, 
already  under  Clem's  influence  and  ready  at  any  time 
to  do  her  bidding,  and  he  ran  off  sharply  to  sec.  He 
had  not  gone  far  when  Clem  came  nmning  from  tlic 
other  end  of  the  Passage,  and  in  a  moment  had  flung 
herself  upon  Pennyloaf  and  was  striking  and  tearing 
at  her  tigcrishly.  P>ob  hastened  bark  to  the  rescue  ; 
gripped  Clem's  arms  and  forced  them  behind  her 
back,  and  so  holding  her,  cried  to  Pennyloaf,  "  You 
run  off  'ome  !  If  she  tries  this  on  again.  Ml  murder 
her !  "  Pennyloaf's  "  hysterical  cries  and  frantic 
invectives  "  were  still  making  the  Pa.ssagc  ring,  but 
Bob  repeating  his  command,  she  obeyed,  and  wIk  ii 


308  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

she  was  well  out  of  sight,  he  released  Clem,  and  laughed 
scornfully  at  her  as  she  went  off  vowing  vengeance. 
But  so  long  as  the  Passage  is  there,  the  sight  and 
hideous  noise  of  that  combat  remain  in  it  for  anyone 
who  has  read  the  Nether  World. 

Being  so  far  north,  we  will  go  back  down  the  Goswell 
Road,  in  which  Mr.  Pickwick  lived  when  he  lodged 
with  Mrs.  Bardell ;  cross  Clerkenwell  Road  again 
where  it  joins  Old  Street,  turn  off  to  the  right  out  of 
Aldersgate  Street  into  Charterhouse  Square,  and  end 
our  pilgrimage  in  the  Charterhouse,  where  Thackeray 
went  to  school,  and  afterwards  sent  so  many  of  his 
characters.  Philip  Firmin  was  brought  to  it  by  his 
mother,  in  Philip,  and  was  laid  up  ill  in  it  during  the 
holidays  in  a  room  whose  windows  opened  into  the 
Square.  References  to  the  Charterhouse  crop  up  in 
several  of  Thackeray's  minor  works,  but  the  old 
school  has  its  principal  place  in  The  Newcomes.  Clive 
Newcome  belonged  to  it,  like  his  father  before  him, 
and  when  the  Colonel  returns  from  India  and  goes  to 
see  his  son  there,  they  "  walk  the  playground  together, 
that  gravelly  flat,  as  destitute  of  herbage  as  the 
Arabian  desert,  but,  nevertheless,  in  the  language  of 
the  place,  called  the  green.  They  walk  the  green, 
and  they  pace  the  cloisters,  and  Clive  shows  his  father 
his  own  name  of  Thomas  Newcome  carved  upon  one 
of  the  arches  forty  years  ago." 

Pendennis,  too,  was  a  Charterhouse  boy,  and 
towards  the  end  of  The  Newcomes,  writing  as  the 
supposed  author  of  that  book,  he  says  : 

"  Mention  has  been  made  once  or  twice  in  the 
course  of  this  history  of  the  Grey  Friar's  School — 
where  the  Colonel  and  Clive  and  T  had  been  brought 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.      309 

up — an  ancient  foundation  of  the  time  of  James  I., 
still  subsisting  in  the  heart  of  London  city.  The 
death-day  of  the  founder  of  the  place  is  still  kept 
solemnly  by  Cistercians.  In  their  chapel,  where 
assemble  the  boys  of  the  school,  and  the  fourscore  old 
men  of  the  Hospital,  the  founder's  tomb  stands,  a 
huge  edifice,  emblazoned  with  heraldic  decorations 
and  clumsy  carved  allegories.  There  is  an  old  Hall, 
a  beautiful  specimen  of  the  architecture  of  James's 
time — an  old  Hall  ?  many  old  halls  ;  old  staircases, 
old  passages,  old  chambers  decorated  with  old  por- 
traits, walking  in  the  midst  of  which  we  walk,  as  it 
were,  in  the  early  seventeenth  century."  He  goes  on 
to  describe  a  Founder's  Day,  and  to  tell  how  attending 
it  on  the  12th  of  a  December,  he  looked  up  from  the 
service  in  the  chapel  and  saw  seated  among  the  black- 
coated  old  pensioners  Colonel  Newcome,  fallen  on 
evil  days  and  come  here  for  refuge,  to  end  his  life  as 
one  of  the  Poor  Brethren  of  the  Charterhouse.  On  a 
later  occasion,  Pendennis  comes  with  Ethel  Newcome 
to  visit  the  Colonel  ;  he  chances  to  be  out  for  the  day  ; 
but  they  go  into  his  room,  and  Kthd  looks  "  at  the 
pictures  of  Clive  and  his  boy  ;  the  two  sabres  crossed 
over  the  mantlcpiecc  ;  the  Bible  laid  on  the  table 
by  the  old  latticed  window."  In  this  same  room  the 
Colonel  lay  ill  at  last  and  dying,  and  you  remember 
the  close  of  his  story  :  "  At  the  usual  evening  hour 
the  chapel  bell  began  to  toll,  and  Thomas  Ncwcomc's 
hands  outside  the  bed  feebly  beat  time.  And  just  as 
the  last  bell  struck,  a  peculiar  sweet  smile  slione  over 
his  face,  and  he  lifted  up  his  head  a  little,  and  (juickly 
said  '  Adsum  !  '  and  fell  back.  It  was  the  word  wc 
used   at   school,  when   names  were  called  ;    and   lo, 


310  THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 

he,  whose  heart  was  as  that  of  a  Httle  child,  had 
answered  to  his  name,  and  stood  in  the  presence  of 
The  Master." 

No  scholars  are  there  now  ;  the  school  has  been 
removed  outside  London  ;  but  you  may  see  the  place 
just  as  Thackeray  pictures  it,  and  it  is  still  a  quiet 
haven  for  the  Poor  Brethren  of  the  Charterhouse. 
The  chapel  bell  that  Colonel  Newcome  heard  still 
rings  at  the  usual  hour  every  evening,  as  they  tell 
you  it  has  rung  every  evening  for  some  three  cen- 
turies ;  and  in  Washouse  Court  they  show  you  what 
is  traditionally  the  room  in  which  the  Colonel  lived 
and  died. 

Since  we  must  end  somewhere,  we  may  as  well  end 
here,  against  Smithfield,  where  we  began.  Not  that 
our  theme  is  exhausted  ;  it  is  inexhaustible.  All  our 
great  English  authors  have  spent  some  of  their  time 
in  London,  from  Chaucer  downwards  ;  more  than 
half  of  them  have  lived  many  years  in  it ;  many  of 
them — I  believe  I  should  not  be  far  wrong  even  if  I 
said  half  of  them — were  born  in  it,  and  as  often  as 
not  it  is  their  personal  experiences  of  it  that  they 
have  written  into  the  lives  of  their  characters.  It  is 
always  decaying,  and  passing  away,  and  renewing 
itself.  Once  London  was  as  fuU  of  houses  and  streets 
associated  with  the  imaginary  men  and  women  of  the 
Elizabethan  dramatists  (those  loyalest  of  Londoners) 
as  now  it  is  of  associations  with  the  imaginary  people 
of  Dickens,  Thackeray,  Gissing  ;  as  to-morrow  it  will 
be  of  similar  associations  with  the  characters  of  the 
imaginative  writers  of  to-day  ;  and  it  is  because,  for 
all  its  stem  realities,  it  is  such  a  wonderland  of 
glorious   dreams    that   every   true   Londoner   sighs, 


OXFORD  STREET,  HOLBORN,  ETC.       311 

in    his   heart,    with    that   good    cockney,    Henry    S. 
Leigh  : 

The  haunts  we  revelled  in  to-day 

We  lose  to-morrow  morning  ; 
As  one  by  one  are  swept  away 

In  turn  without  a  warning.   .   .  , 
No  nook  nor  cranny  dear  to  me 

Should  undergo  removal. 
Though  Progress  went  on  either  knee 

To  beg  for  my  approval  I 


INDEX 


Adam  Street,  255 
Adcock,  St.  John,  32 
Addison,  Joseph.  248,  280 
Adelphi  Hotel,  255-6 
Ainsworth,     Harrison,     38,     42, 

151,  203,  227,  250,  272,  280 
Albany,  The,  281 
Alchemist,  The,  238 
Aldersgate  Street,  20,  308 
Aldgatc,  56,  133,  134,  13G-8 
Aldwych,  250 
All  Sorts  and  Conditions  of  Men, 

140,  142-7 
Alsatia,  222-7 
Amelia,  270-1 
Amen  Corner,  206 
Angel,  The,  Islington,  97 
—  Court,  Southwark,  184 
Anne  Doleyn,  155 
Apsley  House,  272 
Askew,  Anne,  11,  12,  13 
Austin  Friars,  99 


Bank,  The,  73,  74,  75,  98,  219 
Bankside,  120,  198-202 
Barbican,  25,  165 
Barclay    &    Perkins's    Brewery, 

181 
Bardolph,  34,  161-3,  249,  268 
Barnaby  liudge,  42,  69,  70,  171, 

180,   195,  240,  262,  283,  292, 

302 
Barnard's  Inn,  38,  297 
Bartholomew  Close,  13,  20,   29, 

30.  31 
—  Fair,  lo,  11,    13,  19,  121 
Bartholomew  Fair,  5,   1O-19,  54, 

58 
Bartholomew  Lane,  7O 
Battersea,  175 


Baynard's  Castle,  172 
Bayswater  Koad,  282 
Beaconsfield,    Lord,    70-2,     131, 

261,  273 
Beadnell,  Maria,  112 
Bear    Garden,     Bankside,     198, 

201 
Beaumont,  Francis,  60,  267-8 
Beaumont   &    Fletcher,   51,   59, 

203,  212,  246 
Bedlam,  195 
Bell  Alley,  77,  113 
Bell  nj  St.  Paul's',  The,  120,  14S, 

172,    173,    197-201,   205,    206, 

220 
Belle  Sauvage,  The,  208,  213 
Bell  Yard,  237,  238 
Ben   Jonson    Tavern,    The,    124, 

M7 
Berkeley  Street,  278 
—  Square,  280 
Bermondsey,  175 
Besant,    Sir    Walter,    44-7,    72, 

120.    139-47.    172.    173.    »74. 
I       185,    196,    197-201,   205,   20O, 
j      214,    220,    264-6,   267,    275-6, 
I      283,  285,  286-7 
I  Besant  and  Kicc,  28 3 
I  Bctl  Iclum  Hospital,  195 

Bcthnal  (irccn,  147 
I  Bcvis  Mark.s,  125-31 
I  Beyond  the  Dreams  oj  Avarice,  72, 
I      264-6,  267 
I  Billingsgate  Market,  170 
!  Bir(  h  s,  74 
I  \'>n<  bin  Lane.  to2 

Jiirdragf  Walk,  271 

Birri-in-Hand  Court,  58 
I  Binliop's  Court,  236 
I  Bishopsgatc    Street,     icx;.     ii6- 
I       lii,  261 

313 


314 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


Black,  William,  256 
Blackfriars    Bridge,     196,     199, 
228 

—  Road,  87,  97,  196,  228 
Blake,  William,  81,  175 

Bleak   House,  228,  232-35,   236, 

237,  243.  287,  296,  297-8 
Bleeding  Heart  Yard,  299 
Bloomsbury  Square,  292 
Boar's  Head,  The,  160,  161,  162, 

163 
Bobadil,  Captain,  64-7,  78 
Bofi&n,  Mr.,  231,  232,  238 
Boleyn,  Anne,  153,  256,  267 
Bolton,    Fanny,    26,    239,    240, 

242 
Borough,    Southwark,    92,    181- 

187 
Bouverie  Street,  i 
Bow  Church,  60,  61 

—  Lane,  58 

—  Road,  147 

—  Street,  70,  252-3 
Bond  Street,  281 

Brass,     Sampson,     125-7,     129- 

131 
Bread  Street,  50,  57,  59 
Brick  Court,  Temple,  242 
British  Museum,  289,  291-2 
Brixton,  175,  189 
Bronte,  Charlotte,  99,  206 
Browne,  Matthew,  207 
Browning,  Robert,  159 
Buchanan,  Robert,  243-4 
Buckingham  Palace,  271 

—  Street,  254,  257,  258,  260 
Bucklersbury,  62 

Bull  Inn,  Bishopsgate  Street,  57, 
120 

Whitechapel,  138,  139 

Bunhill  Fields,  81 

—  Row,  79 
Bunyan,  John,  39,  81 
Burbage,  120 
Burney,  Fanny,  190,  283 

Bury   Street,   St.   James's,   238, 

280 
Butcher     Row,     Aldgate,     135, 

137 
By  Proxy,  234 
Byron,  Lord,  28 j 


Cade,  Jack,  68,  152,  156,  157, 
163-4,  182 

Caledonian  Market,  28 

Camberwell  Green,  188 

Camden  Town,  84,  291 
{  Camomile  Street,  119 

Cannon  Street,  120,  163,  202 

Terminus,  199 

Canterbury  Pilgrims,  The,  182 

Carey  Street,  236 
J  Carlton  Terrace,  262 
I  Carlyle,  Thomas,  235 
:  Carton,  Sydney,  47,  240,  285 
j  Caxton,  William,  268 
I  Chadband,  Mr.,  17,  237 

Chancery  Lane,  229,   231,   232, 

233,  234 
I  Chaplain  of  the  Fleet,  The,  214 
j  Chapman,  George,  78 

Chapter  Coffee  House,  206 

Chapter  House  Court,  206 

Charing   Cross,    189,    245,    246, 
253,  259,  261,  270 

Charles  I.  statue.  Charing  Cross, 
259,  269 

Charlotte  Street,  288 

Charterhouse,  The,  22,  308-10 

—  Street,  26,  27 

Chaste  Maid  in  Cheapside,  A,  5, 
56 

Chatterton,  Thomas,  206 

Chaucer,     137,     174,    180,    181, 
182 

Cheapside,  51-74,  75,  102 

Chelsea,  117,  269 

Cheshire  Cheese,  The,  220 

Chichester  Rents,  237 

Child's  Bank,  228,  231 

Chimes,  The,  229,  235 

Chiswell  Street,  25,  79 

Chiswick  Mall,  269 

Chivery,  John,  187,  197 

Christian    government,    79,    80, 
142,     164,     217,    218,    300-2, 

304 
Christ's  Hospital,  48 
Christopher    Tadpole,    194,    249, 

250,  259,  274 
Church  Street,  Westminster,  263 
City  Madam,  The,  194,  213,  214, 

215 


INDEX 


815 


City  Road,  66,  73,  75,  79,  80,  81- 

92 
Clapham,  175 

Clarence,  Duke  of,  153,  157 
Claypole,    Noah,    26,    177,    178, 

179,  253 
Clement's    Inn,    248,    250,    254, 

291 
Cleopatra's  Needle,  243 
Clerkenwell,  5,  56,  93,  05,  299- 
308 

—  Close,  95,  304 

—  Green,  299,  302,  303,  306 
Cliflford's  Inn,  232 

Clink  Prison,  202 

—  Street,  202,  218 
Cloth  Fair,  13,  21 
Cock  Lane,  14 

Cock  Tavern,  220,  229 
Cockney,  his  love  of  London,  i, 

3.  (ii.  3" 
Codlin  and  Short,  129,  130 
Coldharbour  Lane,  1S9 
Colebrook  Row,  96 
Coleman  Street,  65,  66,  67,  77, 

78 
Coleridge,  S.  T.,  48 
College  Place,  291 
Collins,  Wilkie,  291 
Colonel   Jack,    20,    21,    78,    138, 

289,  290 
Congrcv'c,  William,  270 
Constitution  Hill,  270 
Cook,  Mrs.  E.  T.,  280 
Cophapus,  Phincas,  35 
Cornhill,     50,     7^,     74,    99-1 11, 

180 
Coryat,  Thomas,  58 
Covent  Garden,  252-5 
Cow  Cross  Street,  4,  6,  7 
Cowper,  William,  170 
Cowley,  Abraham,  77 
Cozeners,  The,  235 
Craven  Street.  258 
Crawley,  Kawdon,  237,  278-80 
Cromwell.  Kicliard,  8i 
Crosby,  Hall,  117 
Cross  Keys,  Wood  Street,  27.  52, 

53 
Crown  Office  Row,  240 
Crown  Tavern,  14,  15,  ^t, 


Cruncher.  Jern,',  227,  228,  229 
Crystal  Palace,  i 
Cursitor  Street,  237,  238,  278 
Curtain  Theatre,  81 
Curzon  Street.  27S-80 
Custom  House,  148.  170 
Cutter  of  Coleman  Street,  77 
Cuttle,  Captain,  109 


Dagmar    Street,    Camberwell, 

189 
Damay,  Charles,  47 
David    Copperfield,     75,     87-92, 

112,   139,   167,   170,   177.   195. 

208-10,    237,    254,    256,    257- 

259,  260-1,  288,  291,  294,  296, 

299 
Davidson,  John,  204 
Deans,  Jeanie.  247,  269 
Dean  Street,  Soho,  284,  287 
Dean's  Yard,  266 
Defoe,  Daniel.  20,  21,  76,  77,  78, 

loi,  102,  131-138,  289,  290 
Dekker,  Thomas,   49,   100,   loi, 

110,  III,  1 60 
Democratic  government,  217 
De  Morgan,  William.  32 
Denmark  Street,  286 
Dc  Quincey,  Thomas,  283 
Devcreux  Court,  246,  248 
Devil  is  an  Ass,   The,  59,   100, 

273 

Devil  Tavern.  220,  230 

Dickens,  Charles,  22.  33,  38-41, 
47,  51,  61,  62,  69.  70,  75,  77. 
84-92,  99,  102,  103-10,  rii- 
114,  125-59,  165-7,  »7'. 
177,  181,  183,  184-g.  190, 
195.  106,  197,  207-10,  219, 
220,  227,  228,  231-8,  240, 
247.  251,  252,  253,  254,  256- 
257,  259-61,  263,  271,  281,  284, 
285,  2H7.  288,  290- 1,  292.  293- 
294,  2t>5-6,  297-300,  302,  303, 
306,  308 

D'Isracli,  Isaac.  131 

Doctor's  Commons,  183,  207-10, 

257 
Dodson    &    Fogg,    Messrs,    102, 

"3 


316 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


Dombey  &  Son,  109,  171 
Donne,  Dr.  John,  51,  53,   229, 

268 
Dorset  Street,  224,  226 
Doulton's  Potteries,  190 
Dove  Court,  63,  64 
Dover  Street,  280 
Dowgate,  174 
Downing  Street,  261,  262 
Drury  Lane,  237,  250 
Duke  of  York's  column,  3,  269, 

271-2 
Duke  Street,  Aldgate,  125 
Piccadilly,  281 


Eagle  Tavern,  The,  84,  85,  86 

Eastcheap,  160 

East  End,  The,  138-47 

—  India  Dock  Road,  147 
Edgware  Road,  282 
Edwin  Drood,  295-6, 
Elephant  and  Castle,  228 
Elinor,  Queen,  58 
EUzabeth,  Lady,  155,  213 

Ely   Place,    Holborn,    157.    298, 

299 
Embankment,  Thames,  243-4 
Emerson,  R.  W.,  i 

—  Street,  198 
Esmond,  42,  253,  272 
Essex,  Earl  of,  153 

—  Street,  250,  251 
Etty,  WilUam,  256 
Evelina,  190,  283 
Evelyn,  John,  196 

Every  Man  in  his  Humour,  63, 

64'-8,  81 
Every  Man  out  of  his  Humour,  54 
Exmouth  Street,  306 


Fagin,  22,  42,  177 

Falstaff,  4,  5,  34,  63,  114,  160, 

248-9,  268 
Farmhouse,  The,  187,  188 
Farquhar,  George,  234,  255,  270 
Farringdon  Road  Buildings,  299- 

302 
—  Street,  39,  168,  170,  215,  217, 

218,  219,  299 


Fetter  Lane,  220,  297 
Finsbury,  56 

—  Pavement,  78 

—  Square,  25,  75 
Field,  Inspector,  188,  285 
Fielding,    Henry,    42,    47,    253, 

270-1,  295 

—  Sir  John,  70 
Finch  Lane,  loi 

Fish  Street  Hill,  167,  170 
Fitzroy  Square,  288 
Fleet  Lane,  214 

—  Market,  39,  214 

—  Prison,     114,     213,     214-18, 

268 

—  Street,  209,  213,  219-31,  237, 

245 
Fletcher,  John,  180 
Flyte,  Miss,  233,  236 
Foote,    Samuel,    165,    219,    220, 

235.  248,  295 
Ford,  John,  149 
Fore  Street,  78 
Forster,  John,  235 
Fortune  of  War,  The,  14 
Fortunes 'of  Nigel,  The,  114,  153, 

154,   173,  225,  226.  229,  230, 

270 
Foster  Lane,  52 
Foundling  Hospital,  35,  293-4 
Fountain    Court,    Temple,    242, 

243 
Foxe's  Book  of  Martyrs,  11.  12, 

13 
Frederick's  Place,  63 
Freeman's  Court,  Cornhill,  102 
Fridav  Street,  51,  59 
Furnival's  Inn,  165,  296,  297 
Furnival  Street,  296 


Garden   Court,   Temple,   242, 

243 
,  Garlick  Hill,  173 
'  George  and  Vulture,  The,  'j'j,  112, 

I       "3 

i  George  Court,  246 

I  —  Yard,  Borough,  183 

—  Yard,    Lombard   Street,    77, 
I  112,  113, 

i  Gerrard  Street,  Sobo,  31,  285 


INDEX 


Sit 


Gibbons,  Grinling,  213 
Giltspur  Street,  8,  13,  34,  38 
Gissing,  George,  44,  63,  80,  92- 
97,   98,  121,  122-4,    167,   176, 
1S9,    191-210,   211,   235,   236, 
247-8,  251-2,  266-7,  269,  284, 
288,  289,  292,  299-308 
Globe   Theatre,    181,    198,    199, 

201-2 
Golden  Butterfly,  The,  283 
Golden    Cross    Hotel,   254,   25S, 

259,  261 
Golden  Square,  283,  284 
Goldsmith,  Oliver,  44,  206,  241, 
242 

—  Buildings,  231,  238 

—  Street,  53 
Gone  Astray,  61 
Goodman's  Yard,  147 
Gordon  Riots,  42,  69,  70,  195 
Goswell  Road,  308 
Governing  caste.  The,  217,  218 
Gower,  John,  180 
Gracechurch    Street,    103,    115, 

n6,  120 
Gray,  Thomas,  102.  152,  158 
Gray's  Inn,  294 

Road,  295 

Great  College  Street,  264-6 

—  Coram  Street,  293 

Great  Expectations,  22,  27-31,  52, 

53,  139,  1 88-9,  242,  297 
Great  Fire  of  London,    14,   58, 
152,  165,  203 

—  Russell  Street,  292 

—  St  Helens,  117 

—  Smith  Street,  263 

—  Tower  Hill  (sec  Tower  Hill) 
Grecian  Coffee  House,  248 
Green  Arbour  Court,  44 

Greett     Dragon,     Fleet     Street, 

224 
Green  Park,  272 

—  Street,  287 
Greene,  Robert,  174 
Grey,  Lady  Jane,  153,  154 
Gresham.  Sir  Thomas,  120 
Grove  Lane.  CambcrwcU,  i8g 
Guildhall.  Oo.  61,  62 

Guy  Fawkcs  conspirators,  153 
Guy's  Hospital,  181 


Hampstead,  291 
Hand  Alley,  131 
Hand  Court,  252 
Hanging-Sword  Alley,  226,  227, 

228 
Hanover   Street,    IsUngton,    S2, 

92-6 
Harley,  Earl  of  Oxford,  256 
Harrow  Alley,  135 
Hartshorn  Lane,  258 
Hart  Street,  Bloomsbury,  291 
Hatton  Garden,  298 
Haunted   London,   44,   91,    159, 

202,  217,  218 
Haymarket,  259,  269 
Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  204 
Hazlitt,  WilUam,  48 

—  W.  C,  295 

Heart  oj  Midlothian,    The,    247, 

269 
Heep,  Uriah,  257 
Henley,  \V.  E.,  260.  268 
Henrietta  Temple,  261 
Henry   IV.,    4,    5,    34,    63,    114, 

160,  267,  268,  294 
Henry  V.,  267,  268 
Henry     VI.,    153,     156.     163-4. 

182,  240,  267 
Henry  VIII..  256,  268 
Heriot,  Master,  114,  154 
Herrick,  Robert,  57 
Hcxam,      Lizzie,      103-8,      176, 

263 
Hey   for    Honesty,    Down    with 

Knavery,  5,  57,  78 
Hey  wood,     Thomas,     58,     115, 

289 
High  Street,  Oxford  Street,  285 
llobson,  50,  57,  120 
Holborn.  59.  75.  '37-  '57 

—  Viaduct,  38,  39,  299 
Holinshcd's  Chronicle,  1O4 
Holywell  Street,  250 
Hone,  William,  116 

Hood,    Thomas,    57,    204,    203, 

252 
Hornet,  Jack,  22 
Horse  Guards,  The,  261 
Horsemongcr  Lanr.  1H7 
Hosier  Lane,  i  j.  15,  26,  27,  33, 

34 


318 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


Houndsditch,     109,     121,     12^, 

125,  131-6 
Howland  Street,  288 
Hoxton,  66,  Si 
Human  Odds  and  Ends,  189,  221, 

222, 
Hungerford     Stairs,     195,     254, 

256 
Hunt,  Leigh,  48 
Huxter,  Mr.,  26 
Hyde  Park,  270-5,  290 
Hyde  Park,  252,  272-3 

In  the  Year  of  Jubilee,  lOj,  176, 

189,  247,  266,  284 
Irving,  Washington,  160,  161 
IsUngton,  73,  82,  92-7 
Ivy  Lane,  49 

Jack  Straw's  Castle,  291 
Jacob's  Island,  179 
Jaggers,  Mr.,  27-31,  53,  285 
Japhet  in  Search  of  a  Father,  34, 

35.  36 
Jeffries,  Judge,  153 
Jerrold,   Douglas,   6,   7,   8,   220, 

235 

Jingle,  Mr.,  183,  207,  216 

Johnson,  Dr  Samuel,  27,  219, 
241,  245,  249,  250,  252,  255 

Johnson's  Court,  220 

Johnson  Street,  290 

Jonathan  Wild,  47 

Jonson,  Ben,  5,  15,  16-19,  51, 
54.  58,  59,  60,  63-8,  78,  81, 
100,  116,  117,  181,  201,  220, 
230,  231,  238,  258,  273,  289 

Journal  of  the  Plague,  76,  77, 
131-8 

Katherine,  Queen,  153 
Keats,  John,  57,  181 
Kennington,  165,  189,  190 
—  Road,  189,  190,  191 
Kentish  Town,  289 
King  of  Denmark,  The,  43 
Kingsley,  Henry,  269 
King  Street,  Cheapside,  60,  61 

Westminster,  268 

King's  Bench  Prison,  92,  183 
Walk,  225,  240 


I-Cing  WilHam  Street,  161 
Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestle,  The, 

58,  138,  203,  212,  246 
Lady  Clancarty,  272,  285 
Lady  of  Pleasure,  The,  246-7 
Lamb,  Charles,  48,  96,  no,  116, 
219,  240,  245,  252 

—  Court,  238-40 
Lambeth,  175,  191 

—  Bridge,  192,  193 

—  Church,  192 

—  High  Street,  193 

—  Marsh,  194 

—  Walk,  191,  192 
Lame  Lover,  The,  248 
Langham  Hotel,  283 
Lant  Street,  181,  195,  197 
Laud,  Archbishop,  153 

Law  Courts,  Strand,  209,  246 
Leadenhall  Market,  no 

—  Street,  103,  108,  109 
Leicester  Square,  228,  253,  287 
Leigh,  Henry  S.,  61,  103,  311 
Leighton,  Sir  F.,  204 
Limehouse,  139,  176 

—  Church,  147 
Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  234-6 
Hall,  232,  236 

Little  Britain,  13,  20,  27,  28,  29, 

31.  38 
Little    Dorrit,    112,    176,    1S4-7, 

197,  212,  293-4,  299-300 
Liverpool    Street    Station,    121, 

122,  123,  124,  190 
Lombard  Street,  77,  112-4 
London  Bridge,   161,   167,   176- 

180,  199 
Station,  180 

—  charm  of,  i,  2,  3,  191,  192 
London  Lackpenny,  55,  121 
London,   Poor  of,    79,    80,    141, 

142,  164,  191,  192 

—  Stone,  163-4 

—  Wall,  76,  78,  165 
Long  Acre,  250 

—  Lane,  6,  8,  13,  21,  22 
Longmans,  205 
Lothbur\',  75,  76 
Lovat,  Lord,  153 
Love  and  a  Bottle,  234 
Love  in  a  Wood,  270 


INDEX 


319 


Lovelace,  Richard,  221 

Love  Lane,  Bankside,  198,  201 

Eastcheap,  165 

Ludgate  Hill,  22,  205,  206,  209, 

210,  212,  213,  214 
—  Square,  212 
Lydgate,  John,  55,  121 
Lytton,  Lord,  252,  2S1 


Macaulay,  Lord,  102,  281 

MacUse,  Daniel,  235 

Magpie  Alley,  226 

Magwitch,  Abel,  38,  242 

Maiden  Lane,  252 

Manchester  Square,  280 

Manette  Street,  285 

Mansell  Street,  148 

Mansion  House,  70,  72-4,  102 

Marble  Arch,  282 

Marlowe,  Christopher,  196,  201 

Marryat,  Capt.,  34 

Martin  ChuzzlewU,  52,  99,    165- 

167,  242,  254,  294,  297 
Marshalsea,  The,  17O,   181,  183, 

1S4-7 
Mary,  Queen,  37,  155,  213 
Massinger,  Philip,  180,  194 
Melville,  Lewis,  280 
Merlin  Place,  Clerkcnwcll,  306 
Mermaid   Tavern,    The,   51,    59, 

60 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor,  The,  5 
Micawber,    Mr.,    75,    87-92,    97, 

183,  291 
Middlesex  Street,  121,  124 
Middleton,  Thomas,  5,  56,   173. 

297 
Middle  Temple  Lane,  230,  238, 

243 
Midsummer   Night's    Dream,    A, 

242 
Mile  End,  138 

Green,  248 

Road,  1.^1,  142,  I.J5,  147 

Milk  Street,  38 

Millais,  Sir  K.,  204 

Millbank,  263 

Milton,  John,  57,  78,  79,  221 

Minor,  The,  165,  219,  295 

Minories,  109,  135,  137,  138 


Mitre  Court,   Wood   Street,   54, 
64 

—  Tavern,  Heet  Street,  220,  241 
Mitre  Tavern,  The,  Wood  Street, 

54 
Moncrieff,  W.  T.,  287,  291 
Monmouth,  Duke  of,  153 

—  Street,  284 
Monsieur  Tonson,  287,  291 
Monument,  The,   165,   166,  167, 

168-70 

—  Yard,  165 
Moorfields,  20,  66,  78 
Moorgate  Street,  77 
More,  Sir  Thomas,  120,  153 
Morley's  Hotel,  261 
Mornington  Crescent,  289 
Morris,  Sir  Lewis,  259 
Mother  Redcap,  The,  289 
Murray,  D.  Christie,  219 
Muses'  Looking  Glass,  The,  5 
Music  and  poverty,  141,  142,  191, 

192 
Myddleton  Passage,  Clerkcnwcll, 
300  8 


Nancarrow,  Tottv,  193.  195 

Nancy,  22,  23-O,  37,  177-9 

National  Gallery,  The,  2O0 

Ned  of  Aldgatc,  138 

Nelson,  20  j 

Nelson's  column,  3,  2O0 

Nether     World,     the,    81,    82-4. 

92-7,   123,   124,  236,  247.  292. 

299,  300-8 
New  liroad  Street,  98 
Newcomes,  The,  22,  98,  no,  204, 

238,  275,  282,  283,  288,  291. 

308-10 
New  ('ut.  The,  191 
Newgate  Market,  39,  49 

—  Prison,     22,     24,     28,     41-8, 

53 

—  Street,  37,  41,  42,  49 
New  Gruh  Street,  288,  289,  29a 
Newman's  Court,  102 
Newman  Street,  2H7 
Newport  Street,  Lambeth,   193, 

194 
New  Square,  234 


d20 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


New  Turnstile,  294 

Nicholas   Nickleby,    27,    38,    39- 

41,   171,   204,   247,   271,   283, 

290,  294 
No  Other  Way,  47 
Norfolk  Street,  250,  251 
Northumberland  Street,  258 
Northward  Ho  !  22,  50,  164,  230 
Norton  Folgate,  98,  121 
Not  so  Bad  as  we  Seem,  252 
Nym,  162-3 


Obelisk,    Blackfriars    Road, 

195 

Old  Bailey,  39,  42,  44,  213 
Old  Cheshire  Cheese,  The,  251 
Old     Curiosity     Shop,      125-31, 
148,  236,  254 

—  Ford,  100 

Old  George  Inn,  The,  183 

—  Jewry,  63-8,  190 
Old  St.  Paul's,  137,  203 

—  Street,  81,  82,  83 

—  Square,  233 

—  Swan  Pier,  176,  177 

Oliver  Twist,  22,  23-6,  33,  177, 
178-80,  253,  258,  298,  303 

Orange  Girl,  The,  44-7,  48,  185, 
285,  286-7 

Our  Mutual  Friend,  103-8,  139, 
176,  231,  232,  238,  263,  281, 

303 
Oxford  Street,  75,  282-5 


Pall  Mall,  269 
Pall  Mall  Gazette,  215 
Palmerstone  Buildings,  120 
Pantheon,   The,   Regent  Street, 

283,  284 
Panyer  Alley,  49,  50 
Paper  Buildings,  240 
Paradise  Lost,  -jq 

—  Street,  Lambeth,  193 
Park  Lane,  282 

—  Street,  Southwark,  202 
Parish,  Christopher,  12 1-4,  190 
Paternoster   Row,   49,    50,   205, 

206 

—  Square,  49 


Patron,  The,  219 
Paul's  Wharf,  173 
Payn,  James,  234 
Peckham  Rye,  175 
Pecksniff,  Mr.,  99,  166,  242 
Peel,  Sir  Robert,  51 
Peggotty,  Mr.,  237,  258,  261 
Pendennis,    26,    180,    190,    206, 

215,  238-40,  241-2,  253,  272, 

273-4,  280 
Pendennis,    Arthur,     180,     190, 

206,  215,  238.  242,  254,  275 
Pentonville,  75,  85 
People's  Palace,  The,   141,  142, 

146 
Pepys,  Samuel,  15,  5:j,  69,  229, 

251.  256 
Percy  Street,  289 

Per  kin   Warbeck,   149,   150,   151, 

155 
Peter  Lane,  6,  9 
Peter  the  Great,  256 
Petticoat  Lane,  121,  124 
Philip,    The   Adventures  of,    22, 

252,  272,  308 
Piccadilly,  278-81 

Pickwick   Papers,   77,    102,    no, 

113,   114,   181,   182,   183,  207, 

208,  213,  216,  217,  232,  255, 

256,  259,  291,  308 
Pie  Corner,  14,  15,  16,  34,  214 
Pinch,  Tom,  99,  165,  242,  254 
Pip,  27-31,  52,  53,  188,  189,  242, 

297 
Pistol,  162-3,  268 
Plague  of  London,   54,   76,   77, 

131-8,  152 
Plain  Dealer,  The,  171,  253,  262 
Piatt's  Lane,  291 
Pleydell  Court,  220 
Plornish,  185 
Plough  Court,  112 
Pocket,  Herbert,  38 
Poor   of  London,   The,    79,    80, 

141,  142,  164,  191,  192 
Pope,  Alexander,  112 
Portsmouth  Street,  236 
Portugal  Street,  236 
Poultry,  57,  69,  70-2 
Prime   Minister,    The,    78,    234, 

236,  262,  271-2,  280 


INDEX 


321 


Primrose  Hill,  Whitefriars,  226 

Pudding  Lane,  14,  164,  165 

Puddle  Dock,  172 

Putney,  175 

Pye  Tavern,  The,  135,  136 

QUEENHITHE,   1 73 

Queen  Mary,  159 
—  Street,  Cheapside,  120,  197 
Quickly,  Dame,  34,  114,  160 
Quilp,   125,   129,   131,   148,   161, 
162-3 


Racquet  Court,  219 
Rainbow  Gold,  219 
Rainbow,  Tavern,  220 
Raleigh,  Sir  Walter,  51,  153 
Randolph,   Thomas,    5,    57,    61, 

78,  231,  251,  273 
Rands,  W.  B.,  207 
Redcross  Street,  20 
Regent  Street,  68,  283 
Reynolds,  Sir  Joshua,  204 
Richard  II.,  32,   117,   119,   155, 

156,  298-9 

Richard  III.,  117,  118,  119,  151, 

157,  158,  173 
Richardson,  Samuel,  226 
Riderhood,  Rogue,  139,  176 
Rogers,  John.  37 
Ropemaker  Street,  78 
Rose  Alley,  Bankside,  198 
Rosoman     Street,     Clcrkenwell, 

306 
Rotherithe,  176,  179 
Rotten  Row,  273-5 
Royal   Exchange,    b2,    99,    loi, 

III 
Russell,  Lord  William,  153 

—  Square,  292 

—  Street,  252 


St.  Andrew's  Church,  2O 
St.  Ann's  Church,  Soho,  287 
St.  Bartholomew's  Church  8,  9, 

Hospital,    8,  26,  32,  211 

St.  Botolph's,  Aldgatc,  133-O 
St.  Bride's  Church,  221,  222 


St.  Clement  Danes,  249 

St.  Dunstan's  Church,  229,  230 

St.  Ethelburga,  119 

St.  Faith's  Church,  203 

St.  George's  Church,  177,  185-7 

Circus,  195 

St.   George's,    Roman    CathoUc, 

Cathedral,  Westminster,  195 
St.  Giles's,  Cripplegate,  78 
Church,     Oxford     Street, 

285-7 
St.  Giles  and  St.  James,  6,  7,  8 
St.  Helen's  Church,  120 
5/.  James's,  i-jz 

St.  James's  Church,  Clerkenwell, 
303-4,  306 

Church,  Piccadilly,  280 

Palace,  270,  272,  280 

Park,  269-72 

Walk,  303-4 

St.  James  Garlickhithe,  173 
St.  John  the  Evangelist,  263-4 
St.  John's  Lane,  27,  305 

Square,  302,  305 

St.  John  Street  Road,  26,  95,  97, 

303 
St.  Margaret's,  Westminster,  268 
St.  Martin's  Lane,  2O0,  287 
St.  Martin's  le  Grand,  50 
St.  Mary  Axe,  103,  io»»,  125 
St.  Mary-lc-Strand,  24O 
St.  Michael's  Alley,  11  < 
St.  Nicholas,  Dcptlord.  19O 
St.  Pancras  Church,  290 
St.  Paul's  Cathedral.  28,  58.  1O7, 

(only  good  view  of)   199-200; 

202,  .203-12,  240,  243.  245 

Churchyard.  20',.  212 

St.  Peter's,  Cornhill,  102 

Alley,  103 

St.  Sopnichrc'ii,  37,  38,  41 
St.  Swithin'.s  Church,  163 

Lane.  3 

St.  'J  hf)ma.s  Street.  181 

Sackviile  Street,  281 

Sala,  G.  A..  139 

Salisbury  Square,   Fleet  Street, 

224,  226 
Salutation  and  Cat,  The,  48 
Saracen's  Head,  27,  38,  39 
Sawyer,  Bob,  181 


322 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


Scott,  Sir  Walter,  114,  153,  154, 
159,  173,  225,  226,  227,  247, 
269,  270 

Seamy  Side,  The,  220,  275-6 

Serpentine,  The,  275 

Seven  Dials,  287 

Shabby-Genteel  Story,  A.,  171 

Shadwell,  Thomas,  222-7 

Shakespeare,  Edmund,  180 

—  William,  4,  5,  51,  62,  63,  81, 
114,  117-19,  151.  152.  155-9. 
161,  162-4,  174,  181,  182,  198, 
199,  201,  202,  240,  241,  256, 
262,  267,  294,  298-9 

Shallow,     Justice,     248-9,     268, 

294 
Sharp,  Becky,  269.  278-80,  282 
Shepherdess  Walk,  84 
Sheppard,  Jack,  41,  250 
Shirley,  James,  246-7,  272-3 
Shoe  Lane,  219 
Shoemaker's    Holiday,    The,    49, 

100,  loi.  III,  160 
Shoreditch,  5,  56,  81,  82,  121 
Sikes,  Bill,  22,  23-6,  33,  37,  179, 

180 
Silent  Woman,  The,  58 
Silver  Street,  53 
Sir  Harry  Wildair,  234 
Sir     Thomas      Wyatt,     Famous 

History  of,  213 
Six  Jolly  Fellowship  Porters,  139 
Sixteen-String-Jack,  37 
Sketches   by  Boz,    75,  84-6,    177, 

190,  207,  219,  253,  255,  287, 

294 
Smith,  Albert,  194,  249,  250,  259, 

274,  275,  289 
Smithfield  Market,  4,   8-36,   38, 
180 

—  Martyrs,  11,  12,  13 

Smith  Square,  Westminster,  108, 

263-4 
Snobs  and  Suburbia,  175 
Snodgrass.  Mr.,  113,  255,  259 
Snow  Hill,  27,  38,  39,  81 
Soho  Square,  285 
Somerset  House,  246,  251 
Somers  Town,  290 
Southampton  Row,  294 

—  Street,  3 


Southey,  Robert,  205 
Southwark,  92,  180 

—  Bridge,   120,    176,    180,    181, 

196,  197,  199,  202,  221 

—  Cathedral,    180 
Spaniards,  The  ,291 
Sparkes,      Polly,      121 -4      190, 

235 
Spendthrift,  The,  280 
Spenlow    &    Jorkins,    208,    209, 

257 
Spitalfields,  120,  147,  197 
Spring  Gardens,  262 
Squeers,  Mr.  Wackford,  27,  38, 

41, 290 
Squire  of  Alsatia,  The,  222-7 
Stanfield,  Clarkson,  256 
Staple  Inn,  295-6 
Staple  of  News,  The,  231 
Steele,  Sir  Richard,  248,  280 
Stepney  Church,  146 

—  Green,  144,  145,  146 
Steyne,  Lord,  278-80 
Stone  I3uildings,  234 

Stow's  Survey  of  London,  9,  10, 

14,  50,  68,  147,  149 
Strafford,  159 
Strafford,  Lord,  153 
Strand,    56,    137,    237,    245-59, 
261,  269 

—  Lane,  258 
Streatham,  175 
Suckling,  Sur  John,  259 
Sullivan,  Sir  A.,  204 

Sweet  Lilac  Walk,  Spitalfields, 

120,  197 
Swinburne,  A.  C,  175 
Swiveller,   Dick,    125,  127,   128- 

131.  250 


Tabard  Inn,  The,  181,  182 

Tale  of  a  Tub,  A .,  289 

Tale  of  Two  Cities,  A,  47,  227, 

228,  240,  285 
Tancred,  70-2,  273 
Tarleton,  120 
Tavistock  Street,  253 
Taylor,  Tom,  155,  272,  285 
Temple,  The,  156,  222,  225,  228, 

238, 242-3 


INDEX 


828 


Temple  Bar,  228,  229,  231    237, 
238 

—  Church,  238 

—  Garden,  240-3 

—  Hall,  240,  242 

—  Lane,  226 

Tennyson,  Lord,  60,  159,  229, 
235 

Thackeray,  W.  M.,  22,  72-4,  98, 
159.  167,  171,  190,  204,  220, 
237,  238,  240-2,  252,  254, 
255,  269,  273-4,  275,  278-80, 
283-4,  288,  291,  292,  308-10 

Thames    Street,    44,    165,    170, 

I7I-4,    177,   212 

Thanet  Place,  247-8 
Thavies  Inn,  297-8 
Thrale,  Mr.,  181 
Threadneedle  Street,  98,  121 
Three  Clerks,  The,  48,  loi,  170, 

251,  262,  269 
Three   Nuns    Tavern,    The,    133, 

134,  136,  147 
Thyrza,  189,  190,  266-7,  292 
Todgers's,  165,  167 
Tokenhouse  Yard,  76 
Tom  Jones,  253,  295 
Took's  Court,  235 
Tooting,  175 
Tottenham    Court    Road,    288, 

289,  290 
Tower  of  London,  44,  147,  148, 

149-59,  164 
Tower    oj  London,    The,    151 -9, 

199 
Tower  Hill,  148,  149 
—  Street,  in,  160 
Town  Traveller,  The,  63,  98,  121, 

122,   123,   189,  190,  235,  247, 

251-2 
Traddles,  Tommy,  257,  288,  291, 

296,  299 
Trafalgar  Square,  259-61 
Trick  to  Calch  the  Old  One,  A., 

173.  297 
Trinity    Almshouses,    142,    143, 

144 
TroUope,  Anthony,  48,  78,  101, 

170,  234,  236,  251,  262,  2O9, 

271-2,  280 
Tudor  Street,  225 


Tulkinghorn,  Mr.,  235 
Tupman,  Mr.,  113,  259 
Turner,  J.  M.  W.,  204,  252 
Turnmill,     otherwise    Tumbull, 

Street,  4,  5 
'Tufixt  Axe  and  Crown,  155,  272 
Tyburn,  37,  282 
Tyler,  Wat,  32,  68,  152 
Tysoe  Street,  Clerkenwell,  93,  306 


Unclassed,  The,  189,  247-8,  269, 

303 
Upper  Kennington  Lane,  189 
Upper  Street,  IsUngton,  96 


Vanbrugh  Sir  John,  270 
Vanity  Fair,  171,  237,  269,  278- 

280,  282,  291,  292 
Vauxhall,  189,  190,  194,  195 
Vilctte,  99 
Vilhers  Street,  256 
Virginians,   The,   167,  274,  280, 

284,  288 


Walcot  Square,  Kennington, 

189,  190 
Waller,  Edmund,  253 
Walnut   Tree    Walk,    Lambeth, 

i'»i.  193 
Walton,  Izaak,  22<> 
Walworth.  Sir  William,  32 
Wardour  Street,  283,  284 
Warrington,    (k-orge,    180,    206, 

215,  238.  274,  284,  288 
Warwick  Lano,  48,  40 
Wi.ttTlfW)  Uridgc,  i<)4,  252 
Way  oj  the  World.  The.  270 
WcbHter,   John,  22.   50,  54,   59, 

62,  120,  164,  213,  230 
Wcll>rck  Street,  283 
Wcllcr,  Sam,  102,  no.  182,  183, 
207,  232 

—  T<jnv.  1 10,  114,  213 
Wellington,  Duke  of,  204,  272 

—  Strrct,  251,  252 
Wcmmick,  Mr.,  29,  30,  31,  53, 

188-9 
Wesley,  John,  8f 


324 


THE  BOOKLOVER'S  LONDON 


Westminster,  io8,  262-8 

—  Abbey,  262,  265,  266-8 

—  Bridge,  194,  243,  263 
Road,  192 

—  Hall,  171,  247,  262-3 
Westward  Ho !  54,  59,  62,  120 
Whitechapel,  138 

—  Bars,  137 

—  Road,  147 
Whitefriars,  222-7 

—  Street,  222,  224 
Whitehall,  247,  262 

White  Hart  Inn,  The,  182,  183 
White  Hart  Street,  49 
White's  Club,  280 
Whitfield's  Tabernacle,  288 
Whittington,  Dick,  60 
Wild,  Jonathan,  41 
Wilderness  Lane,  226 
William  the  Conqueror,  151,  152 
Will's  Coffee  House,  252 
Windmill  Tavern,  The,  64,  65 
Windsor  Terrace,  86-92,  183 
Wine  Office  Court,  219 


Winkle,  Mr.,  114,  259 

Wise  Woman  oj  Hogsdon,  The,  58, 

115,  289 
Wit  Without  Money,  59 
Woman  in  White,  The,  291 
Wood  Street,  27,  52-5 
Wordsworth,  William,  19,  55, 194 
Workmen's    Dwellings,    79,    80, 

300-2 
World  Went  Very  Well  Then,  The 

196 
Wormwood  Street,  119 
Wrayburn,    Eugene,    107,    108, 

231,  238 
Wren,  Sir  Christopher,  200.  203 
Wyatt,  Sir  Thomas,  155,  213 
Wych  Street,  250 
Wycherley,   WilUam,    171,    253, 

255,  262,  270 


Yellowplush,     Jeames,    71-4, 

280 
Young,  Edward,  267 


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